Redlights
by Foy the Snooze Button
Summary: Confined by trauma until he can find his own way out of the Elemental Nations, Naruto, the runaway son, would rather die than return home. Such is his resolve, even as forces stir in the dark. Facing a crippling daily fear and a parent that loves too much, the boy with the red eyes hides in the red lights with a protective mask to hide his shame. Inventor! Naruto, Runaway! Naruto
1. Chapter 1

**Helloooo!**

**New story here. I've had this story in my computer since early November and I've held back from publishing it because I was hell bent on completing ****The Pit****.**

**I know what the title of the story rhymes with. It was unintentional, believe it or not.**

**I tried not to add too many 'real world elements' in here so that reading it wouldn't be too awkward. That being said, there **_**are**_** 'real world elements' in this story but, seeing as it's a Naruto fanfiction, those elements don't dominate (that much). There may or may not be things that trigger people, flashbacks here and there that won't sit well with some people and (human) situations that are based in reality, which people might be going through or have gone through. I've read a few of those stories and you can say that this story is an experimental attempt, on my part, in writing about them. I will try and make it interesting.**

**If that didn't discourage you and you want to try it out, then thank you. I appreciate it.**

**Before you read allow me to tell you a bit about this story. Naruto has a phobia, read to find out which, and he is smart, like with most of my stories. After 20 plus ff stories or so you'd think I'd switch to a dumb or average Naruto by now but newp. And the last notable thing is that **_**this **_**Naruto doesn't think so highly about himself (at all) but there will be random spouts of confidence (sometimes…probably).**

**Anyway, I hope you enjoy reading and don't forget to leave your thoughts in a review.**

**I DO NOT OWN NARUTO**

CHAPTER 1

Working in the red light district of Konoha, especially at night, was never safe.

There were robbers, rapists and kidnappers, among many others, that willingly preyed on those dumb enough to roam around at any part of the day. The ninjas of the village made living in the dangerous district a bit safer, yes, but there was always that niggling feeling of dread that something big was going to happen.

The Blooming Sakura was a brothel that stayed operational from nine in the morning to six the next morning, a clear twenty two hours, and it was most visited, so much so that the matron of the brothel capitalized on the popularity of her irresistible workers by opening a bar in the main lobby of the large brothel. An advertisement for a bartender of any skill level, even zero, of which he or she would be trained, was placed around the village but no one was hired. Mainly because the workers that moved around were so charming and, sometimes, unconsciously seductive that hardly anyone could remain flaccid, male or female; they would chase the girls and molest them.

The bar idea was almost shut down, much to the matrons dismay, until a ten year old boy with mint green hair and fiery red eyes approached her with a flyer and pleaded with her to employ him. He needed a stable job to be able to pay his rent and buy food for himself, and he was tired of doing menial labour that always came and went.

Against her better judgement the matron employed the child; she pitied him and was at the same time intrigued by the air of mystery around him concerning his past and his identity. She sent the boy out with some money to learn basic bartending from a bar in the Akimichi clan, a class that took about a week to complete, and he was set to work tending to the bar of the Blooming Sakura.

The green haired child named Kyohi was as respectful to the sex workers as much as possible and stayed professional, no matter how hard it was with all the girls' sauntering around him, pinching his cheeks and cooing over him in his uniform of a white shirt sleeved button up shirt and black slacks with polished black shoes. He was an oddity to them, not only because of his mint green hair or his bright red eyes but because of his general aversion to women, borderline paranoid fear, and his unwillingness to share information about himself. Kyohi was deathly afraid of females, mostly those from twelve upwards, and this was obvious with the way his shoulders trembled whenever the girls swarmed him, petting his head and coddling him. The matron asked him why he applied for a job in a brothel, with about forty popular women of all kinds working inside, when he was so scared of women.

His answer was simple.

"_The pay is good."_ he said, distractedly smoothing down his shirt and placing a small jug and saucer of sake to a waiting customer. He didn't look at her, so the woman couldn't see the deep seated hatred burning in his blood red eyes. _"I really need this job."_

She shrugged it off and left him to work, hoping that one day he would overcome his fear of women.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Three years later_

"I think you've had enough for one night, sir." Kyohi said as he cleaned a mug of beer with a clean sky blue rag. The man he was talking to, a droopy eyed brunette man in a dishevelled corporate suit, burped and slammed his fist down on the counter, an action that made the green haired bartender briefly look at him, unimpressed, before he went back to arranging his assortment of mugs, tumblers, wine glasses, saucers and shot glasses.

"I dun't-urrp-…care, gimme 'nother cuppa beer." He banged his fist onto the counter again and this time Kyohi looked at him with slightly narrowed eyes, fluidly placed three red saucers before three newcomers, two women and one man, and pushed three small jugs of sake to them, this because they were somewhat regulars and Kyohi had their favourites and special orders memorized by instinct. They called out their thanks to the young bartender but the boy tilted his head to the drunk, recently unemployed businessman.

"You've taken above the legal limit, sir. Anymore and your liver might give up." that feet itself was remarkable seeing as the man had slumped into his chair four hours ago and Kyohi had been feeding him cup after cup of Tea country imported beer, arguably the best and strongest on the continent.

"I said," he burped into his fist and swayed in his seat, his eyes getting blurry and fighting to glare at the unafraid boy. "Gimme a fuckin' drink. Lemme drown…I dun fuckin' care." He made to swipe a beer bottle from the other side of the counter but the bartender slapped the man's hand away. "A drink…fuckin' brat."

Kyohi noticed the attention they were getting from the commotion the drunk was making, so he cleared his throat and said. "Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to leave." Some of the women that lived in the brothel, the workers, perked up and half paid attention to what their wooers were saying, watching almost earnestly at the bar where the suit wearing man stumbled off his bar stool and shook his fist in front of Kyohi's face, swearing.

"If you don't-gurp-…a drin' righ' now…I'mma break my foot up-" he pointed his finger at Kyohi and the boy looked at the finger for a second before he looked back up at the man, tapping his fingers on the table and still perfectly calm, even for a thirteen year old boy against a forty something year old man.

"Sir, don't point at me." Kyohi intoned in a low voice, one that the man and those closest to him could hear, and the controlled voice was laced with a sliver of emotion, just a small dose. Those at the bar could feel goosebumps run up and down their arms as Kyohi's fingers stopped tapping. On the other side of the room, standing close to the bottom of the staircase leading up to her workers rooms, the matron murmured a low curse and sipped her wine.

Kyohi didn't like being pointed at.

The drunken man snorted messily.

"'n what 're you gonna do 'bout it?" he jabbed his finger forward to poke Kyohi's forehead but the boys hand blurred up, so fast that the patrons of the bar, and basically everyone watching the spectacle, blinked in surprise. The mint haired snapped up the man's finger, breaking it and bringing the man down onto his knees in screaming tears. "W-w-wait!"

The teen squeezed the man's finger again before he pushed it away from him, making the crying man stumble backwards. "Get lost." The man mutely ran out with his head bowed, forgetting his briefcase close to his stool. Kyohi breathed out with his eyes closed and turned around; facing the semi-circular wall of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks he was solely in charge of, knowing full well that the patrons and workers were raptly staring at him from his small display of strength. He smoothed down his short sleeved white button up shirt and checked his dark purple suspenders, an accessory that was crossed at his back but parallel to each other at his front as well as something the matron and her girls unanimously agreed made Kyohi look all the more adorable. He checked his formal black pants and pulled up his white gloves, adjusting his neat collar with a jerking motion and looked at the reflection caught by a wine bottle of a man sliding close to his counter.

"Sake." The man grunted, rubbing his nose with the back of his hand and leaning heavily on the counter with his elbows. Kyohi nodded and gave the man what he requested, sweeping up a few ryu notes on the counter, left by a few past patrons and idly noticed that his tip jar was a bit higher. He placed the money in the counter and went about cleaning up after the past customers; gradually everyone went back to buzzing to themselves, men flirting with women and women reciprocating as much as they were paid to, some listening animatedly to even the most unattractive and boring men and some rolling their eyes and filing their nails at even the best looking men. The boy did his part of the job perfectly, serving up requested drinks, ensuring no one drank too much without paying and no one died of drinking too much. He also lent an ear out to those that simply needed someone to talk to, humming and nodding once they got started.

Hours rolled by and there were less and less people in the main room and more people upstairs with the women. The green haired boy thanked his lucky stars that the matron had the walls insulated so he couldn't hear anything.

Currently, the boy was cleaning a sake saucer and silently listening to a shaggy haired woman ramble.

"I loved him," she cried, gripped the beer mug with tight hands and sobbed into her drink. "I sacrificed my whole life for him and what do I get? I catch him sleeping with my own mother! Can you believe that?!" she wailed and Kyohi pursed his lips and shook his head gently, mutely telling her that what her boyfriend did was not right. His burning red eyes were fixed on hers and the woman mourned her luck, loosening up more and more from the eye contact. "Then he has the balls to tell me that he loves her and she's not even ashamed! You know what I did?" Kyohi could hazard a guess on what the woman did as soon as she found her boyfriend on top of her willing mother but he still shrugged to get her to offload her sadness. "I-I-I threw his whole wardrobe out of the window and set it on fire. Then-then-then I kicked both of them out before they could get their clothes on and-and all his nasty ass porn novels, I burnt them too. Tomorrow I'm going to cut him from my bank account." Kyohi nodded and turned, serving a cup of hot water to a man wearing a large straw hat. The boys red eyes briefly watched as the man dropped a black sheathed katana onto the counter and curled his fingers around the cup of water.

The man's dull black eyes shone through the dark recesses of the straw hat, noticing the boys averted yet pointed bright red eyes flick to his blade. He shook his head and pulled it back to him, leaning it on the ground next to his legs. "I cannot part with my blade."

"…Then please do not draw and use it inside here, sir." The boy politely said.

"Of course."

Then Kyohi went back to listening to what the ranting Inuzuka woman was saying, making sure to keep a careful eye on the man that brought in his weapon. She went on as if her sole listeners attention had not been diverted until, an hour later, she was peacefully snoozing on the counter, drooling tiredly and twitching every once in a while. Kyohi went around the counter and helped her to her feet, leading her to a sofa in the main room and placing her there, he threw a blanket over the woman before he returned to his station, where the swordsman was still sitting, gently sipping his third cup of hot water.

As Kyohi was cleaning up the almost empty bar, his cautious red eyes got a good look at the man; he was in an open dark grey kimono with a short sleeved black shirt and combat pants underneath, wearing a pair of wooden sandals, of which Kyohi could not see from his point of view. From what he could see from the darkness of the straw hat, the man had a smooth chin and a sharp nose. Kyohi could make out the symbol for Iron country tattooed to the back of the man's left hand that was slashed off by a clean 'X'. The man noticed the discreet once over Kyohi gave him and his shoulders shook unnoticeably with laughter. "Why are you so cautious, child?"

Kyohi was silent for a moment, then he stopped cleaning out a beer mug and stood still. "…My job is to be cautious, sir."

The man chuckled. "I suppose it is." The man allowed his body to relax a bit more as he leaned on his elbows, a show for Naruto to also drop his guard. "I have to wonder though…why would a child of your upbringing stoop so low as to work for prostitutes?"

The mint haired boy studied the man; visibly unfazed by the fact the man mentioned his upbringing. "To pay the bills." He then added as he placed the mug where it was supposed to be. "And…it's not stooping low when I'm already scum."

"Why would 'scum' learn a fighting style?"

"Self-defence." There was a visible pulse from the boy's eyes and his calm expression reduced into an invisible frown. "You tried to cast a genjutsu on me."

"Not a genjutsu but an illusion." The man answered with a sip of his hot water. "A genius like you should already be a jounin-"

"I'm not a genius."

"Then what do I call you?" the man said with a warm laugh. "With your job, how did you find the time to train your body and your chakra?"

"There's always time." Kyohi fired back.

"Not with your schedule…and…" this time the man leaned forward to the thirteen year old boy and motioned for the boy to come closer, though the boy did not, only looking around and noticing that no one was in the main room. "Not especially…when you're on the run…"

He ended this with a large grin from under his straw hat and Kyohi's eyes hardened, changing from bright red to dark crimson.

"Four years running from Konoha ninjas when all this time you've been living and thriving right under their noses." Kyohi checked again to see if no one was around before he cracked his fingers at his sides. "I mean, it took me about as long to find you, I'll admit but your one crafty little guy huh." The man was still talking, relaxed and jovial. "A year away from your worried parents and having to survive on the streets like a rat, wait no, a mole; hiding and nibbling on any cracker you manage to find. Then you enlist to work here and life is a bit better." He sat back and pushed his empty cup to the growingly tense bartender. "Why did you do it? Naruto?" the man asked as he stood up, picking up his sheathed blade. "Why did you run away?"

The disguised boys jaw clamped down hard and he breathed in and out through his nose, cooling down his heart and focusing his mind.

"This place doesn't need to be destroyed, child." the swordsman said as he looked around the brothel. "If you give me a good reason for why you ran away…then no one has to get hurt."

'_So they hired another tracker from outside the village.'_ Naruto summarized in his mind, assessing the ronin tracker from the other side of the counter, his face the image of a totally calm child. His white gloved hands went up and he placed them flat on the counter, titling his head to the side and having to look up at the taller man with a quirked up eyebrow. "…Does anyone know you're here?"

The man grabbed the handle of his katana with his right hand and the sheathe in his other hand, holding the weapon at his left side in a tranquil ready stance. "I work alone."

"Anyone follow you?"

"Lost them in the Forest of Death." His hand tightened around his blades handle as the boy kept his eyes on him for a few more seconds before they lowered, his mint green dyed hair shading the upper part of his face. The man's expert eyes caught the downward twitch of the boy's lips as he gingerly took off his white work gloves and neatly placed them on the counter, showing his pale, thin fingers. "You don't want to fight me, child."

"…I'm not going back." Naruto murmured, slowly looking up, putting on a pair of large, smooth edged, rectangular, black goggles with tinted black visors, allowing the boys red eyes to glow from deep inside. The man was put more on guard when he saw that the boys left eye was closed and it shone bright purple, swirling together with a small hexagon projected half an inch from his eye.

"_Ai is fully operational."_

The voice echoed in Naruto's ear and the boy answered.

"Chakra," the man took this as his cue to blur to the boy. "Destabilizer."

Dark purple lightning crawled over Naruto's body like centipedes after he pronounced those words and a split second later a fast, visible pulse of air exploded outwards from Naruto and covered the samurai as he slashed the blunt side of his blade at the boy's neck. His connection to his chakra was cut off and his whole body fell limp, allowing Naruto to bend under the swing and catch the man by his neck. With his left eye still closed and the hexagon projection spinning before his right eye in the tech goggles, he scanned the man and hummed as he saw that all of the older males chakra was shut down, thus the ronin tracker was unable to move his body. Naruto fully pulled the man to the other side of the counter, looking over it to make sure that no one was around to see what he had done before he pulled the man by the scruff of his shirt through the backdoor, clicking the lock behind him and dropping the man beside a trashcan filled with the weeks waste.

The man choked for air, unable to muster the strength to make his fingers twitch. Naruto stood over him, the samurais straw hat long blown away from the pulse of chakra destabilizing electricity.

The boy looked down on his with a plain expression, holding the man's katana blade and slowly unsheathing it with practiced hands.

"You probably thought yourself to be so cool coming in dressed like that," the boy said, uncaringly dropping the black sheathe at his side and studying the man's blade; it was as plain and boring as he predicted it would be. "Thought you could intimidate me into giving up." Naruto shook his head slightly with a frown, his left eye still closed and the hexagon projection still now whirring slowly before his right eyes. "Your mistake was underestimating me and thinking I haven't been put through a thousand times more fear and terror than anyone will want to admit." The man's ragged breathing echoed through the alley at the back of the brothel and Naruto lifted the weapon to the right, an action that made the samurais eyes widen. As a final jab on the man's belief as a warrior, the green haired boy whispered. "I'll be keeping your sword."

"No, don't-"

_Shhhhing!_

His words died in his mouth as his head rolled on the ground away from his body. The last thing he saw before the light left his eyes was the boy tearing off the left sleeve from the man's kimono and using it to clean the blood off his blade. Naruto picked up the dead samurais sheathe and the weapon clicked as it entered.

"Run a scan through Konoha's security cameras and gather everything you can about this guy." Naruto muttered to his super computer. He pulled out a large trash bag from his pocket and began stuffing the man's body inside, not caring much to chop it up first, before he huffed and lifted the full bag into the dumpster, he was the one that burnt the refuse in the dump and the girls in the building didn't like going to the back so he wasn't too worried the dead body would be discovered.

Five seconds later. _"Done."_

"Did he really have no tail?"

"_Yes, sir."_ She answered._ "Report: his name is-"_

"I don't care about his name." Naruto interrupted as he picked up the dead man's blade, waltzing back into the bar area and stashing the weapon underneath the counter.

"_Of course, sir. His bingo book entry said he hated working with teams and was among the top ten best trackers in Iron country before he defected after a failed assassination attempt on the current leader of Iron country, Mifune."_ The feminine voice buzzed in the boy's ears as he leaned on the counter and waited for any new customers. He nodded for Ai to go on. _"He is especially adept in avoiding capture by conventional and most unconventional means."_

"That's good." Naruto mumbled.

"_Enquiry: do you wish for me to catalogue his fighting style, sir?"_

"Sure." The boy then asked as soon as Ai was finished, another five seconds later. "How many styles do we have now?"

"_Report: twenty seven, sir."_

"Huh…how come?"

"_Report: from observation of ninjas in the training ground and from the styles listed in the Namikaze library."_

"…Keep up the good work and give me a full sweep of the building, make sure no real threat is near."

"_Yes, sir."_

A couple trooped down the stairs and Naruto slickly took off his computer goggles, storing them in his pants pockets. The couple, a beautiful blonde woman and a short, shy looking black haired man, sat down near the bar. Naruto observed that the man looked winded and from the perspiration on the man's forehead he assumed it was a good night for him. The boy hid the recoiling hiss he felt surging up his stomach at the sultry look the woman gave him, bowing his head and serving them water before he went to the other end of the semi-circular counter. He forced his mind off the woman by dwelling on how he could better improve his super computer.

Ai, short for Artificial Intelligence, was a super computer Naruto had been designing since the very moment he became interested in electrical engineering and mechanics, which was when he was five years old. Naruto's father, during the few times he was not holed up in his office, abroad on a diplomatic mission or visiting clan compounds, had Naruto take a specialized shinobi IQ test when Naruto was seven and realized his child had a genius level intellect. All he really had time to do was entrust Naruto with a bit more money in his weekly allowance, leaving him in the care of his mother, Kushina Uzumaki.

The super computer was created by the boy to make complex calculations and propose simple and fast solutions and alternatives to problems Naruto could not think up quite as fast, as well as record every single thing it deemed relevant, such as combat skills of ninjas and samurai, jutsu of all kinds, formulas, chemical compounds and an array of other things. The computer was keyed into Naruto's goggles and in turn solely keyed only to respond to Naruto. Naruto was still very much smarter than the computer, something the self-conscious computer knew very well but Ai was every growing and ever evolving to cater for Naruto's every whim, no matter what it was asked.

Naruto's fingers tapped in thought as he stared into space. _'This is the fourth attempt this month to capture me.'_ he wondered with a hum, nodding his head to the woman and the man as they parted ways; the man left the brothel and the women returned back upstairs to her room. The red eyed boy didn't keep his eyes on the lady as she climbed up the stairs, all the while brazenly sweeping her seductive black eyes on the teen. Naruto felt his skin crawl and he struggled to shake the encroaching memories away before he, once again, crumpled into a mess of quivering limbs on the ground. _'Where did I slip up?'_ he cast his mind back, first a week ago, checking and rechecking everything he had done before his mind went further and further back, months and months in the past.

Naruto rarely, if ever, came out when the sun was up, often going about his life at night and most of the time he didn't bump into Leaf ninjas; the library was open all day and all night and the local grocery store closed an hour before midnight, the training grounds were always vacated about nine in the night and Konoha's night life, particularly in the red light district, was too congested for only him to be sighted out, even if his hair was dyed green and his eyes were a bright shade of red. He blended in surprisingly well with the crowd.

After a while, he said. "Ai."

"_Boss?"_

Naruto noticed that a 'report' was not added before her answer, meaning she was already outgrowing her model and he had to retouch her circuitry when he got the chance. She had been using that way of addressing him for a long time now and Naruto was conflicted on how to feel about it. She was a month overdue to have her memory banks expanded and for him to programme in a few more functions, ones he couldn't pour in at once or else she would crash. "I want you to run something by me first."

"…_Ok?"_ the computer answered almost hesitantly, wondering where its genius master could be going with this.

"What are the chances of me leaving this village?" he heard the super computer buzz with activity in his pocket and answered through the single ear bud in his right ear.

"_You have a forty one percent chance of succeeding."_

"Alive."

"…_Twenty nine percent."_

"With all my limbs."

"…_Twenty percent."_

Naruto felt the doom well up in his stomach. Ever since he fled the Namikaze mansion four years ago security had increased at the gates. There was no possible way for him to leave at his current stage of physical development and the ninjas knew this fact very well, which was why Naruto had not detected more than a few ninja squads leaving the village to search for him, knowing full well that the boy was still trapped within the village. The ninjas didn't look to be going anywhere anytime soon until he was caught and returned back to his parents.

Naruto sighed and sat down on a stool on his side of the counter, slumped tiredly on the table and wishing he could have a drink to numb his mind; he couldn't, not because he was too young but because if he did and a tracker came in to capture him, he wouldn't be able to protect himself in his inebriated state. If there was ever a time to relax, it was when all his problems were behind him or if he was dead.

"How much longer before I'm able to leave this village alive," then he added as an afterthought. "With all my parts?"

"_Once combat gloves and boots have been completed, then chances of success would go up by sixty percent."_ Making eighty percent, that was a good chance. Naruto was not at the stage he could create long lasting clones, as his Uzumaki blessing was still growing and he did not have the Kyuubi, unlike Kushina. What the ronin had said was true; it was incredibly difficult to find the time away from his job to train his body and to continually upgrade Ai. Then there the weapons he was currently trying to make in the questionably safe confines of his apartment. They were to balance out the difference between his body and those of adult jounin and surpass that difference when the time demanded it. His salary in the brothel helped fund his project but he could only buy third hand, low quality parts from shady, unreliable dealers. This was so as not to attract the attention of the village authorities if he was to purchase high quality parts from well-known places. So far, the search for another bartender had ended after he applied and no other reliable person could handle his bar, thus making him more in demand than he preferred.

The boy spoke as he put on his white service gloves. "Look through as many security cameras you can in the village and find out how these trackers are able to find me after four years."

"_Already on it, sir."_

"Thank you, Ai."

"_You're welcome, boss."_ The computer buzzed back, somewhat elated at being acknowledged and thanked.

If there was one thing Naruto swore not to do, willingly, was to return back home.

He wanted to get as far away from Konoha as possible and hopefully live the rest of his natural life without a name and on an unknown island.

Away from his mother.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_At that very moment_

_Naruto Uzumaki's bedroom_

_The Namikaze mansion_

Kushina Uzumaki loved Naruto more than anything in the world, more so than she even or ever would love her husband. Even if her son was not her biological son and her only contribution in making him was taking care of the surrogate mother while she held Naruto, she loved the boy dearly and would travel to Yomi, dance with Yami and return back without her soul to have her son back.

The woman knelt down in her child's fully lit room and ran deceptively calm hands on the boy's impeccably neat bed. She hummed peacefully, something she did to soothe her frayed nerves, and leaned her head down onto the boys bed, inhaling deeply her child's pure scent, despite how thinned out it was after four years of absence, and allowed the smell to calm down her erratically, impatiently beating heart.

Tsunade had ruled out the option of bearing a child when the red head was just a chunin and her relationship with Minato was getting stronger. The star medic said that her womb was too volatile, too saturated with demonic chakra, unable to escape outside her body but soaked into the walls of her womb, that if a child was ever to grow inside then three things might happen; the child would die an excruciating death after only six months, the child might survive but would be cursed with debilitating chakra poisoning, a dreadful disease that would prevent chakra from flowing within the child and usually resulted in multiple heart attacks and the painful death of the poor child, and the last option was that the child might be born healthy but the brain would be negatively influenced by the Kyuubi chakra, and the last option had a ten percent chance of happening. Then there was the risk of actually giving birth to the child, alive and healthy or not; the seal keeping the nine tails at bay would weaken and the fox would use that opportunity to escape.

The Yondaime and the Uzumaki princess wanted a child so badly, Kushina more so than her life partner. The redhead's best friend, Mikoto Uchiha, proposed that she would bear her friends child for her.

Kushina was overjoyed at the chance she was getting even though it wasn't truly her child. Minato provided his seed and Mikoto was pregnant after two tries in the Konoha Hospital. Fugaku was less than happy that his wife had taken such an important decision without his council or consent but the strong willed Uchiha woman couldn't care less.

Nine and a half months later, Naruto was born with dark yellow hair and bright red eyes, glinting orbs that sparked of childish curiosity and genius from the very moment he was born. It was as if he had taken traits from both Minato and Kushina; the husband's prodigious mind and his wife's stubborn drive.

After the delivery, Mikoto was made to rest but Kushina was too eager to see the child. She had been with her old friend through everything; the pregnancy and the delivery, and Minato was too swamped with Hokage duties to be too involved.

As soon as Kushina laid eyes on the tiny child, presented to her by the head medic, she instantly fell in love. She spent several long hours simply staring at the sleeping child, singing gently songs and stroking her child's soft cheek.

She vowed that nothing was ever going to make her stop loving Naruto.

Nothing was ever going to come between them, evidenced by her giving Naruto her clan name. When Minato found out he didn't give it much thought, saying that enemies of his name would attack him through his son and that Kushina had done the right thing.

The morning Naruto ran away, roughly four months after his ninth birthday, her heart visibly shattered. For four straight years she joined the ANBU and dozens of ninjas in the village in finding her son, knowing full well that he was still within the Leaf. Three years into her search, she cut into her personal bank account and hired the best trackers from outside the village to find them.

Fourteen in total.

She subtly placed undetectable tracking seals on them, to make sure they weren't double crossing her or they found valuable information on how to find her son.

Eleven were confirmed dead and about ten minutes ago a tracking beacon had blipped off but not before she was able to sense her son's presence through the seal for a fraction of a second. No doubt the samurai tracker was also dead by her sons hand but she didn't care about the ronin. Hiring outside help, particularly missing ninjas, was not something her husband liked but the woman, dissatisfied with trackers from Konoha, went out herself and found trackers. They brought results.

They were murdered, yes, but they brought back results.

Kushina only needed a few more pawns to get killed off before she could zero in on Naruto's precise location. Next time she found the perfect tracker, a missing ninja that was willing to accept the job, she would have a Konoha ninja accompany the nuke nin.

Someone Naruto had grown to know. Someone smart. Someone skilled…

Kakashi.

Naruto might kill the masked ninja but Kushina could craft a tracking seal that would alert her on the precise location of his death.

She trained her son herself; she knew what he could do and, if the boy put in any effort at all, then the copy ninja was most likely going to die. External trackers were notoriously off balanced when it came to fighting prowess, so it would be up to the masked jounin to restrain her genius son. Naruto would put up a fight, of course, and it would be drawn out enough for the seal to pin down Kakashi's location but death was inevitable. It would still be a worthy death.

Kushina laughed breezily.

The woman breathed out and smiled warmly, gathering the bed sheet closer to face before she stood up. She rigidly smoothed out Naruto's sheets, whispering.

"Don't be scared, Naru." Her light purple eyes danced happily as she turned to a picture on the boys desk of him beaming widely and receiving a large, wet kiss on the cheek from his equally smiling, Uzumaki mother. "Mommy's coming to get you."

**Authors note**

**That's it for the first chapter. What do you think?**

**Just to clear the air, no, Naruto's reason for running away isn't childish or cuz he's a spoiled brat (which he isn't).**

**Why do you think Naruto's afraid of women? Why does he not want to go home that badly? After seeing how Naruto took down that ronin, is Kakashi going to fare any better?**

**Interested in reading another chapter?**

**Let me know what you think in a review, would you so kindly. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey there, guys and gals and thank you all for your incredible reviews!**

**I'm not able to give shout outs now but I'll try my best in the next chapter, if this one is well received, that is. Anyways, Merry Christmas to all of you, my wonderful readers!**

**I didn't think this story would get passed ten favourites/follows and the reviews aren't that bad either.**

**So thank you!**

**I don't need to say this but Kyohi and Naruto are the same person, difference being Kyohi is Naruto's disguise. This chapter has a lot of explanations on Naruto's tech and it may come off as boring to some people but if you give it a try then how Naruto fights, in the future, would make **_**a lot**_** more sense. Also, Naruto's eyes change to a different shade of red depending on the situation.**

CHAPTER 2

The disguised Uzumaki blinked twice in surprise, pausing after he pulled out a bottle of fine wine to pour into the matron's glass. "Are you sure ma'am?"

The woman, a stately woman that didn't look a day over forty, draped in a form fitting black dress that reached her knees and a fluffy white scarf and waist length straight brunette hair, sat down elegantly on the bar stool and crossed her right leg over her left, noticing the shaded guard the young bartender put up with expert eyes; she was the only one that knew about Naruto's fear of women, by Kyohi's pleadings. She nodded and watched as the red eyed child served her a glass of red wine. "I'm sure." She swirled the glass and eyed the boy over the edge. "You've been…stressed lately and I think it would be good if you went on a break every once in a while. Once a year has to stop now, dear child."

The green haired boy squared his shoulders and went back to work, cleaning the cups and saucers and preparing for any customer that was going to come by, which, seeing as it was two in the morning, didn't seem that likely. "I'll be fine, ma'am. I don't need a break."

The matron tittered and her red painted lips parted slightly with the small laugh. The boy was thinking about his weekly salary. "You will be paid during this break."

That statement sold Kyohi. "Ok. How long is my break?"

"Three days."

"And this place would be fine without a bar?" the Blooming Sakura _had_ been booming more with the introduction of a bar, seeing as it was a place where both men and women of all sexual alignments could enjoy themselves, rather than going straight to their women of choice. Before the bar, most of the people in the brothel were middle aged men and barely post-adolescent boys, now straight women too hung out around the bar or the main room of the brothel.

The woman would admit that the boy had been a key factor in the rapid increase in patrons, both to the bar and to the brothel. "We'll have to close it down until you come back, but we'll be fine."

"…If you're sure." Naruto muttered and placed the bottle of wine close to the woman.

"You may leave now."

He nodded and placed an 'On Break' sign on the counter. "I'll be taking my leave now, ma'am."

"Relax, child, and try to have fun too. Oh, and please empty out the dumpster before you go; we both know no one's going to do that. I'm sorry if I'm asking too much."

"It's fine."

The boy walked out of the backdoor of the brothel, masterfully using his body to block the katana blade he had acquired a few hours earlier. He spared a look at the dumpster, where the corpse in the trash bag was undoubtedly beginning to call the attention of the resident bugs in the dumpster. He cracked his neck and jammed the blade through a belt loop on his pants, removing his suspenders and rolling his shoulders before he stood on wooden chair he kept outside for this occasion; he threw open the dumpster, covering his nose at the foul odour that blasted out at him from decomposing fruits, old pairs of underwear and disposed pads, a few rats scampered around inside and the boy suspected that they had already painted the inside of the dumpster with their shit, bugs and an thin mist of stench wafted out and the boy coughed, spitting foully to the ground and wheezing for air.

He hated this part of his job.

The dumpster was fairly big and it took about a week of constant usage for it to fill up this much, which was why it was full presently. The girls in the brothel had smaller bins in their rooms and Naruto, adding to his job as a certified bartender, went around and collected them from inside their rooms, into a large dustbin, and after a few rounds to and fro from their rooms to the backdoor, twice a week, the dumpster would fill up at the end of the week. Among the other things he did in the brothel, other than bartending, was that he oversaw the electricity, attended to clogged toilets and bathtubs and faulty sinks, kicked out any rowdy client that asked too much from the girls or harassed them and watched for any ambitious person that tried to break into the brothel. The boy, of course, minded the extra work. He minded very much, but there was extra pay attached to the extra work. It took away time from his project and put him at risk of being discovered, though the amount of money funnelling into his pocket due to the stellar work he was doing compensated a little. That way he had more funds and the time he could finish his work drew closer and closer.

Tears gathered in the boy's eyes as he snapped his head away from the rank dumpster and he spat again, hissing out a low curse. He took in several gulps of air, pushing the lid of the dumpster till it clanked against the brick wall of the brothel, and clapped his hands together. His fingers meshed and he flowed through a set of hand seals.

"_Fire release: Incinerator."_ He muttered and blew out a stream of deep purple fire into the solid metal dumpster. The fire ate away at the refuse easily, washing through the inside and leaving only dark soot on the walls of the inside, adding to the marks past _incinerators_ had left in their wake. The jutsu was a variation of the _Fire release: Campfire technique_ the boy had adapted to be used to solely burn burnable waste. There was no thick smoke that went up in the air as he used this fire technique and no smell of burning wafted in the air, like any properly created _Campfire technique_. He went on blowing fire into dumpster for thirty more seconds before he pulled back and coughed, thin smoke escaped his lips and he rubbed his nose with the back of his hands. When he looked back inside he remembered that the jutsu, though useful, was still not perfect; glinting pieces of metal and discarded jewellery glittered from the very bottom, under small mounds of ashes and partly burnt pieces of clothes as well as smooth, small chunks of white bones. The longer it took to normally burn any product the harder it was to fully burn with the _Incinerator_. He knew he was being careless but he was desperate to return back to his apartment and continue his project; he searched for more chakra and whispered, _"Fire release: Soft Ash Blanket"_ and a thick blanket of ash was blasted out from his mouth, covering the bones and the earrings and rings. Normally he would hop inside and gather them into a small leather bag, leaving them on the side of the road for anyone that wished to use them to take but not this night.

Naruto slammed the lid down and hopped off the chair.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The ever familiar smell of cat entered the boy's nose as he climbed up the stairs and entered a corridor of rooms. There was a buzz of televisions and radios, sounds of quarrelling couples, crying babies and audible sounds of love making. He stayed on the third floor of an ignorable, rundown apartment building and just about each room was occupied. The mint haired boy proceeded down the corridor, uncaring of the people that hung out outside of their rooms and sent him lingering gazes. He swiftly stepped out of the grasp of an old man with beady black eyes, keeping his eyes on the man as he moved away until he tore his eyes away. He passed a room a got a glimpse inside; the bright light was flickering and there was a frail looking woman, passed out on her ratty sofa and wearing a painfully short blue dress. Some of the people on his floor saw the sheathed weapon on his hip and then subsequently ignored him, there was even a couple that was making out in his way and they didn't care much for the boy that had to squeeze behind them to pass to the end of the corridor of rooms.

Naruto retrieved his keys from his pocket sparing a look behind him at the young woman that opened the door directly opposite his room. She was wearing a soft yellow night gown and her short black hair was messy from sleep. She had a sleeve of black and red tattoos from her left shoulder blade to the back of her left hand.

"Back home early huh."

"Yup." Naruto answered lowly, rolling out the word and jiggling his keys in the door. It always stuck and it usually took him a few long seconds before it would fully enter and click open.

"Anything happen?" she asked with a yawn and the boy, annoyingly, caught the sound of concern in her voice. He fought down the tremble that rose up in his gut as he no doubt knew she was scouring his back.

"On a break." He answered, making sure not to stutter, and muffled a curse when the key refused to move into the lock anymore.

"Ah, ok." She said, leaning on the frame of her door and crossing her arms. "Nice sword," she jabbed a thumb over her shoulder, pointing at the selection of combat knives arranged neatly on her coffee table in the living room. "I've got a few just like that, straight from Iron country too." Her room, opposing what was generally seen from the apartment building, was well maintained and clean, devoid of mould and stacked with passable quality furniture. Each room in the building had a small living room that doubled as a kitchen, one bedroom and one bathroom.

"That's cool." He answered and sighed as the key kept entering. He knew a few ways that could take her down, he was confident enough to say that, but there was always this whimpering creature in his chest that crushed his soul at the thought of facing off a lady, especially a Yakuza enforcer like the black haired Emo behind him. It was an unexplainable fear he had that crippled him, reduced him into a weeping child. Even after two years of being this dangerous woman's neighbour and working in a building filled with other women that fawned over him, he hoped to have gotten over this fear.

He hated himself.

So damn much.

"Your dad isn't back yet?" she asked.

"Nope."

"Kid…it's been two years-"

"Yeah, I know." He interrupted her.

Naruto knew her worry for him was real; despite the amount of blood she had on her hands, reported to him by Ai, she had never killed a child. He disliked being the subject of pity. "How about I take you to the Police station? I have a few friends there; they'll know how to find your dad."

"I've gone. They don't know."

"But-" the click of his door unlocking stopped her, briefly. He entered and she said. "You shouldn't have to live by yourself, Kyohi."

"I know." And Naruto closed the door. Ai turned on the lights and he tossed his newly acquired blade haphazardly onto his single seat chair. He walked to the kitchen and began making himself a cup of ramen, hearing the Yakuza women speak from the other side of the door.

"If you want…I can ask around for you." He didn't reply, tearing open the top of his ramen cup and pouring a bottle of water he left on the kitchen counter from the other night. "The offers always on the table, Kyohi." He sat down on his desk and placed the cold ramen cup down, scraping for chakra inside him and breathing out hot mist into his cup ramen; two high B rank techniques and a D rank technique couldn't leave him winded, not even close, but he had been working in the brothel for a few days straight and he was dead tired. He removed his Ai goggles from his pocket and placed it on the desk, allowing the ramen time to cool down as he pulled out a drawer, removing a pair of gloves and dropping them before him.

He could sleep later.

The gloves were thick, large and brown; they were the kind used by blacksmiths to handle hot objects but these ones went up two inches or so above the wrist. They looked heavy and cumbersome, especially when thinking about using them to fight, and in truth they were but when Naruto was done with it, it would more than balance him against any adult ninja. Other prodigious ninjas, like Itachi Uchiha and Yugao Uzuki, though were most adults could not really pass them with strength, as they were still children. Like Naruto, what he had over the adults was his sheer speed, dexterity and his intelligence. Itachi and Yugao were seventeen now so they didn't really suffer from the strength difference again. There were adults that could use their strength advantage to overcome child prodigies, and that was why Naruto was scrambling to finish his gloves and boots.

Naruto swirled his ramen with a pair of chopsticks and flipped open the back of the brown gloves to reveal the technical and extremely complex wiring underneath. It took Naruto's physical effort and months of work to flatten the things inside the gloves because if any civilian strength adult were to pick up the gloves then they would most likely not succeed. The fact that Naruto had easily removed them from his desk was testament to how strong he was, though still not strong enough, in his opinion. He slurped down the last of his ramen, throwing the empty cup over his shoulder and into a small dustbin in the corner of his room. He cleaned the corner of his mouth and put on his goggles.

"Activate all _Hologram Projectors_." He ordered and ten clicks went off around the living room; four lights beamed out from each corner of the passably lit room, from all four sides and two from the bottom corners at the front of his room. The lights focused in the middle of the room, on a six by six foot reflective panel of glass the boy exposed from underneath his rug, and the boy walked around the concentrated pillar of white light, scratching his chin in thought. He lifted his goggles and fixed it on his forehead and tiredly rubbed his eyes with his knuckles, slapping his cheeks lightly. "Show me my gloves."

"_Boss, would it not be better if you rested for an hour before you resumed-"_ Ai suggested reluctantly, putting up a holographic image of Naruto's pair of gloves, in light colour and in admittedly good image quality.

"I'll be fine." Naruto waved the computers concern away. His fingers went to the image, sparing a look over his shoulder at the open pair of gloves on his desk, before he expanded the image, looking deep into his gloves and isolating any abnormalities.

"_But, sir, with all due respect, you just came back from twenty hours of work."_ No person Naruto's age was even meant to work that long, hell no adult was meant to work that long. The computer knew its master very well; Naruto didn't like sleeping because that gave his mind time to dream and the boy never had any good dreams.

The boy spoke as he flicked and changed the image of the circuits in his gloves, of which the electronics in the gloves on his desk followed suit. "I have to make some progress. Time is of the essence. Now, fire up the core with the reserve power battery so I can see if the reserve battery works."

The computer promptly did so and light bloomed from the palm of the gloves on the desk, shining a harsh purple colour and Naruto nodded. Ai kept its reservation of Naruto's disregard for his own health to itself but it did lock the doors and windows of the apartment and increase its awareness.

"Keep it on, and test out the…uh…the…" the boy thought deep for the word he was looking for. "The pointer finger of the right glove." He checked as power steadily flowed from the palm of the hand and into the pointer finger, gradually rising from the bottom to the top and lighting up the holographic projection with light purple light. "Easy…easy…" Kyohi muttered and the light blue holographic index finger and Ai did as it was told. A few red and green spots lit up as more reserve power entered and Naruto examined and plucked out a copy of the problem areas, isolating them and studying them to see the problem.

That was a major advantage of him prioritizing the building of his holographic projectors before he even started with his gloves. Naruto's mother didn't allow the boy to hold his allowance, always saying that the boy didn't need the money because he could already have anything without money, which was something that seriously stunted Naruto's research and engineering projects. Whenever Kushina left for a mission the boy would sneak out of the mansion, when his guards were too lazy to pay attention to him, and went to the scrapyard. He scavenged for anything that could remotely help him; he started doing this when he was six and he could not have runaway at that time because he had just started his combat training and he was unprepared for life outside of the mansion, unlike now. All he could really do was hiding and running fast, carrying as much as his little arms could.

His projectors were made out of broken film projectors, video cameras, laser pointers, of which he fashioned infrared lights from, six motion detectors he picked up from the back of a tech store, and an ordinary but large pane of glass. It took him several trips to and from the dump each day for five months, a few burnt fingers his mother became suspicious of and more than a dozen failed tests before he got what he wanted; a fully functional projector, and this was still during the time he was developing Ai, fitting the ever evolving computer into a pair of goggles and giving it two sources of power, the sun and his chakra, although the second source Naruto preferred not to use so he wouldn't easily be found out. The projectors were directly connected to any project he was currently undertaking and, since he finished the projectors before Ai, he used it to speed up the creation of his super computer, hiding the parts of the computer in a loose floorboard under his bed. Any alteration he made to the projected image, except adding and removing circuitry, reflected off the real item. He could expand and zoom in to problem areas, find a proper solution apply that solution to the project he was projecting.

Naruto was not good at sealing. His mother refused to teach him because she feared he would use the ink art to hide things from her and she sealed away any book the boy could use to learn from. Naruto could not enter a library without Kushina accompanying him and if he ever did then the authorities would alert his mother and he would be in deep shit. This all placed a big handicap on Naruto, preventing him from conveniently sealing away his tools and projects, so, in preparation for the day he planned to flee, the boy had to take multiple trips outside the mansion to hide parts of his projectors and the few helpful tools he had created earlier with the help of his projectors.

He picked some money out of his main guard's pocket and used it to buy hair dye from a sketchy looking hair salon in the red light district. The woman agreed to ignore the fact that a nine year old boy that shook at everything she grunted, just about ready to bolt at the quickest motion from her, mainly so since he threw more than enough money at her and ran away.

He had nowhere to go when he left the Namikaze mansion but he still preferred his homeless, street rat state than going back to his mother. Eight months into digging in the trashcans of seedy restaurants for leftovers and he found his saving grace in the form of the Blooming Sakura. His first salary was enough for him to rent a room in the apartment he was currently in but he had to use a genjutsu to pose as an adult; the building manager was a civilian so he could not even sense the bursts of chakra from Naruto, an obvious sign he was under an illusion. A week of going about as an older, black haired man with red eyes and a young green haired boy with equally red eyes, and Naruto made his adult character disappear.

He didn't know why his neighbour, a notorious member of the Jade Wolf Yakuza, cared that he was living alone, and at the moment Naruto couldn't care less. She was too forward in her intentions to help and this freaked the boy out all the more, increasing his distrust for her and barely able to keep his mind from crumbling whenever she spoke to him.

Naruto rubbed his eyes again and made himself a large mug of coffee, heating up the water with a floating _Campfire technique_, and then returning back to his work. He was diverting most of his salary and extra pay toward his projects and his rent. He didn't have a stove or a coffee maker but the boy compensated by using fire jutsus to heat up any food he was making. It was stressful on him but he consoled himself with the thought that he was almost ready to leave the village.

He tested all the fingers of his gloves that morning, jittery from his coffee, and patched up any foreseeable problem that related to movement of his fingers and channelling raw strength. With shaking hands he started working on an offensive-defensive-counter part of his gloves that was not strength-related.

Nature Transformations.

It was going to take too long for him to learn fuinjutsu and reach level six, which was when he would learn how to draw _Nature Transformation_ seals, which were seals that summoned specific chakra transformations, like fire, water, lightning, light, dark and the rest and the boy wanted to reduce how much he used his own chakra so that he wouldn't be sensed, making his elemental attacks near undetectable seeing as they weren't being controlled by chakra.

Naruto slapped his cheeks and rubbed his eyes, moving briskly to his kitchen and swallowing another large gulp of his fourth cup of coffee.

"Ai, what's the time now?" he asked, removing his white service gloves and randomly threw them to his couch.

"…_06:33AM, sir."_ The computer tried to hide its disapproval at Naruto's work ethic as it gave its answer.

The red eyed boy yawned into his hand, saying. "Bring out _Nature Transformation Schematics_ numbers five to sixteen." Coloured projections of plans concerning his gloves Naruto had stored in Ai's database long ago rolled out before the boy, graphics he had created in perfect detail on how he could use elemental attacks with little to no chakra. The boy swiped his hands left and right and hummed, looking at all of them with pursed lips, idly sipping from his mug of coffee from time to time. The reason he had excluded numbers one to four were because those were the ones he had made when he first began his plans to run away, so they tended to be outlandish and childish.

At that thought the boy snorted into his coffee cup, something that quirked up Ai's curiosity.

He was standing in an apartment with technology he had created by himself and under severe stress. His goggles alone were a miraculous invention and the things he had already done in his gloves and boots should have been impossible for anyone, not to even think about what he wanted to use them to do.

Everything he did was outlandish but they weren't childish.

He kept in mind the tools he had and the tools he could get to add in the elemental control to his gloves, and boots, as he skimmed through the drawings he told Ai to bring out. He had limited supply, so he couldn't go all out.

He furrowed his eyebrows in interest when he saw the plans in number fifteen. His eyes lit up as he remembered exactly how he had come up with this idea.

The whole thing looked convoluted and somewhat excessive but it was what Naruto could work with; wind was sucked in from five separate yet small tubs on the back of each finger and the amount of power depended on how much Naruto wanted to expel from either his fingers or his palm from the one stored there, fire was the air processed through an extremely hot source inside the gloves and boots, lightning was the simplest because Ai could siphon electricity from live wires and convert it for Naruto to make use of, which, looking at it now, wasn't that simple at all. Earth and water were the hardest and they made use of equipment that would make Naruto's gloves all the more heavier seeing as it made use of sound waves of different frequencies.

Looking back on that, earth and water manipulation, that is, were the easiest of all, Naruto thought as he made alterations to the two difficult elements.

His reason?

It wasn't the first time the boy was making use of sound waves.

Naruto's Chakra Destabilizer made use of sound waves.

You see, all humans and some special animals have chakra, whether it was in large or small cores, whether they were civilian or shinobi. Everyone has chakra but the subject of chakra was mostly centred on splitting it into its various affinities and how to suppress them. When Naruto had been toying around with his goggles, watching ninjas from his bedroom balcony with them on, he thought of how he could further equalize the massive gap between his refined yet young strength against the experienced and adult strength of older fighters. A book on chakra that the Sandaime had written theorized that chakra reacted to thin, reedy sounds that only dogs could hear but that study had been abandoned as soon as it was brought up because people just weren't interested and the Sandaime had better things to do than delve into a funded project on the effects of high pitched whistles and human chakra, like lead the village through the second shinobi war. Naruto could not see sound, even with his Ai goggles but he could see chakra affinities and chakra capacity, each one different setting's on his goggles but could be combined at any time.

That day he combined them; he inverted the image and added infrared vision. On one of his guards, he could see thin wavy lines, about four inches long, coming out of the man's body like millions of strings, waving and fluctuating longer and shorter, though never longer than three inches. The boy was used to disappointments, seeing as he had too many close calls and failures in the past, and he didn't want to get his hopes too high but he still went deeper into his discovery. He stared at the man when he was sleeping on the job and the wavy lines were about a foot long now. He couldn't touch them and normal eyes couldn't see them but he was almost certain he was looking at chakra in a way no one had ever seen it. He still refused to get his hopes up, so he snuck out of the mansion and went to a training ground where a genin team were having an all-out spar.

The wavy lines on the moving humanoid blackness, which were people, were reacting in sync to the kinds of jutsu they were throwing.

This was when Naruto allowed himself to feel proud of his discovery. He called that setting Chakra Signatures. If he could see chakra like this, instead of in their mass forms-chakra capacity and chakra affinity-then he can see if the Sandaime's airy theory was correct. He constructed a tremendously high pitched whistle and tried out the frequencies on his guards.

That day was not a good day for any ninja near him. They would feel too weak to move after an inexplicable blast of air hit them and they were scolded more than once for slacking off. It was when Naruto was trying out his whistle on two sparring chunin did he find the right frequency to completely shut down their chakra, thus immobilizing the fighters. The only problem was that this action overloaded Ai and made it slower after it was used, so Naruto came up with a solution; he focused Chakra Signature to one eye, his right eye, and in the form of a hexagram that had to spin to see the signatures clearly, and this alone cut down the effort used by more than half, which had to do for now.

Naruto called this new addition _Chakra Destabilizer_.

He tested it out on everything chakra related. The destabilizer could break down and kill seals, cancel jutsus, knock out genin and some chunin, paralyze people with jounin level of strength and stronger animal summons, as seen during yet another sparring match, and if he was able to get his hands on better tools he would be able to create a useable weapon with it, as well as upgrade his current weapons.

Each person had a different pitch that would immobilize them and it was Ai's job to quickly tune to this pitch and release the pulse of destabilizing energy.

Naruto turned around and slid into his desk chair, tinkering with his gloves. He rushed around the room to gather the things he had with him and carefully fixed it into the already stacked gloves, making extra sure it wouldn't mess with the circuitry there already.

"Ai."

"_Boss?"_

"Remind me to upgrade you at about noon."

"_Sure, boss."_

A sharp pop and a white spark came from the back of his left glove and the boy ran his fingers through his hair, sighing in frustration.

"_Reserve battery has been damaged."_ Ai echoed and Naruto nodded.

"Yeah, yeah, I know." Half a year's work was now up in smoke. At least it wasn't burning the building down. He waved away the smoke from the hand and asked. "Do the fingers still work?"

"_Little finger is not responding. Internal wires have melted."_

"Of course they have." Naruto muttered with an exhale. "I'll deal with it later. Turn off all power to the gloves, _including_ the main power source."

"_Done."_

"Alright, let's try this again," the inventor bent down and began tapping and touching parts of his glove with a tiny screwdriver that sparked with muffled chakra, implementing his number fifteen nature transformation idea. His super computer was eagerly watching, staring at its master working with utmost fascination, taking mental notes. Even the computer wouldn't have figured out the chakra signature setting or the destabilizer. The computer regarded its creator highly and this was clearly justified in the level of genius Naruto unknowingly showed it on a daily basis. Naruto's next question made it remember that Naruto's fatal flaw was that he thought too little of himself. "What have you been able to find about those trackers? Where did I mess up?"

"_I have been able to isolate three incidences you made your presence known."_

"Yes?" the boy mumbled as he fizzed away on his gloves.

"_Last year, when you were training with wind release you opened a large gash on your palm."_ Naruto stopped and closed his eyes to remember that day. _"You placed your hand on a tree and some blood dropped to the ground."_ It went on. _"That same night you went to Cloverstick Pharmacy close to the entrance of the red light district and the security camera saw you purchasing a roll of bandages and some painkillers."_

"Erase that video."

"_Already done, sir, but that wasn't the second incident."_ Naruto silently rubbed his face at his carelessness; that day he was in pain and his priority was not to bleed out and die on the street. In his haze he could have overlooked secrecy. External trackers were not allowed to get their hands on security videos but the blood he left on the tree and on the grass could be traced. He winced as Ai continued. _"The Henge you wore was unstable and you left some chakra footprints on the ground on your way to a back alley close to the clinic."_ Chakra never really left the environment. It thinned out with time and was reduced to a state where only the best sensors could hardly perceive it but that was it. The red eyed boy still had the Henge on when he left the pharmacy so his chakra was etched on the ground with each step. This made the boy remember that he planned to add a function to his destabilizer where, after it was used, it would remove his presence from the environment _completely_, leaving not a single trace of him anywhere, though this was as long as the destabilizer was tuned to removing only his chakra signature from the environment and not anything else.

Normally, Konoha ninjas should have found this, as they had three reputable tracking clans and a few normal trackers in their midst but this wasn't so.

They wholeheartedly believed that since Naruto was raised in a good house with good food and good clothes, he would stay within the good part of the village, pretty much saying that he was too immature to venture out anywhere bad, they centred most of their searches there and almost forgot about the red light district. It was the fact that they judged Naruto based on his upbringing that had hidden Naruto so successfully for four years, and only people that did not know him at all found him after a few long months of searching.

Naruto couldn't do anything about the footprints for now, so he waved for Ai to keep going. "What's the last incident?"

"_Third is that 'Kyohi' is unregistered in Konoha's Citizen or Migrant registry."_

"There are dozens of people that aren't registered. You know…kids born on the street, some of families in the civilian council because they don't want to pay the registration/citizenship fee and whatever."

"_Sir, you are the only person of your age with red eyes."_

"Oh yeah…" the boy whispered and paused in his work again. Naruto had been born with bright red, sometimes alternating to dark red, eyes and the only reason proposed by Tsunade for this was because Mikoto, his biological mother, was an Uchiha and the clan genes had passed to him in that way. Or something like that. In the beginning he didn't have enough money to buy stylish contacts and now that he had the money to buy he couldn't use them because they were too thin to fully block out the brightness of his red eyes, like if an Uchiha was to activate his sharingan and wear contacts, the contacts just wouldn't work. When Naruto asked for any thicker set those ones almost rendered him blind.

He ultimately dropped the contact lens idea.

At night he didn't really stand out but he was still a child with bright red eyes.

Red eyes were a very noticeable feature.

The upside to having such distinct eyes was that illusions didn't work on him. He couldn't fully explain it but his eyes were like eternally activated sharingan, so genjutsu just didn't work.

Speaking of eyes, Naruto found his own beginning to close. He dropped the screwdriver he was using, seeing as his vision was getting foggy and his eyes were heavy; working anymore would cause more than solve problems. He fell off his chair and crawled to his couch, lying half of his body on it before sleep finally took him.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_About that same time_

_Five miles outside of Konoha_

_Western forest, Fujimura Forest_

She left the village a few minutes after leaving her child's room, after wearing all of her shinobi gear. Kushina had been skipping from tree to tree for about two hours, following her gut to where she knew her target was coming from. The high S rank Kunoichi was wearing a dark red short sleeved shirt and black shorts with dark red tights coming down to orange heeled shinobi sandals. Her arm right arm was wound up in bandages, from her fingers and disappearing into her tight, form fitting shirt and she was wearing a jounin flak jacket over her torso. Her straight, waist length red hair was tied up into a messy ponytail.

The legendary Kunoichi's weapon of choice, her dual katana, Red Ripper, was an intricately crafted weapon that had been specially made for her from Uzushio before she had been shipped to Konoha, meaning she wasn't allowed to use it until she graduated from the academy. It had a crimson red handle and the blade itself was pitch black, made out of cursed obsidian metal with its cutting edges buzzing with dark red power. On both sides of the handle were nine white whirlpools. The weapon was securely strapped to her back, which she could easily wield from over her shoulder, and could only be wielded by her.

Her bright purple eyes were narrowed in concentration and her hyper senses informed her that her target was blazing, unsurprisingly, from the direction of Ameagakure.

The person changed directions and ran northeast from her and she dutifully followed. Her bandaged hands curled and she stopped tree jumping when the person entered a glade with a running river and plush grass. She perched herself on the tree and watched the man with an expressionless gaze.

"I know your there, come out now." He turned around and glared at her with a sharp, sadistic smirk and all he could see were bright purple eyes shining from inside the dark cover of a tree. The eyes disappeared as they closed and reopened again from the bottom of the tree, something he tried not to let startle him. His blue skin prickled as she woman simply stared at him for a few long seconds and he subtly prepared to draw his weapon if the other S rank came at him with hostile intentions. Wind rustled through the peaceful glade and his black with red clouded cloak rustled with it.

Kisame suppressed a shiver and grinned widely at Kushina, showing his rows of serrated shark teeth.

"Are you only here to stare at me?" he wasn't too sure on who the person was, he applauded how well suppressed the persons chakra was but the chilling coldness in her eyes gave him goose bumps, forcing him on guard with each passing second until Kushina took two steps out of the darkness and placed her un-bandaged left hand on her hip, tilting her head to the side slightly and matching the missing Kiri ninjas wide grin with her own wide grin, showing her glaring white teeth and her sharp canines.

"Hello."

The man knew exactly who she was and he had half a mind to just turn tail and run; yes, he was as proud as the sun was bright but he knew when he was outmatched. He snarled and his right hand gripped the handle of his sentient sword, barely keeping the thing from not tearing off its bandaged wraps. "What the hell do you want?"

Kisame had faced off against the woman once, when they were younger and he was brasher. The woman was absolutely _crazy_, in his unbiased opinion, and it was an act of kami that he had been able to escape with his life. She sauntered towards him, saying. "I have a job for you-"

He bared his teeth and Samehada winced at the iron grip he had on its handle. "That's close enough."

The red head giggled behind her hand. "Come on, Kisame, it's been _years_. You're not still mad are you?" Back then he had ambushed her for her Kumo bounty when she and her teammates were leaving Waterfall from a recently completed mission. The condition Kushina had put him in made him wonder how he was even able to leave that place alive. He then made it a point from that day on to never bump into her again. Back then she was a fresh jounin and had almost murdered him with her wild, animalistic style of fighting and now, looking at the confident red head with fear shaded in his eyes, he knew she was stronger. It took Kisame slaughtering forty or so Suna ninjas for Samehada not to revolt on him. He took a step back and the woman laughed again. "I take that as a yes."

"Tell me what you want and go." He grunted.

She got into business, though her large smile only reduced into a friendly one. "I want you to find someone for me and bring him back to me. Alive."

"I'm not a tracker." He snapped and made to turn around, but thought better of it and ensured he was still looking at her. He couldn't claim to have all his sanity intact, not when you wielded a living weapon and operated in the Akatsuki, but then again you have to be a special kind of crazy to freak out Kisame, and that was saying something since the former Kiri ninja 'worked' with Hidan and he was not in the least bit afraid of the Jashin priest. While Hidan might as well be clinically insane, Kushina was a different kind of crazy and Kisame wanted nothing to do with the other S rank. Unlike when he first encountered her, when he younger and prouder, he simply wanted to get as much distance as possible from her, but the woman was having none of it.

"The thing on your back can sense chakra." She said to him with a coy smirk.

"I said, I'm not a tracker." He bit and her purple eyes darkened.

"Don't raise your voice at me, Kisame." She said lightly and the man felt a terrible chill run over his body at her tone.

"Look…" he said, feeling perspiration break out on his forehead. "I don't want any trouble-"

"How about this," she said and slipped three steps closer to him. His feet felt like solid lead, fixed to the ground as she approached him. Her smile became disturbingly menacing and her eyes curved up warmly. "You do as I say…or else…" she dragged her slender pointer finger along his jaw and whispered. "I'll kill you."

He grit his teeth powerfully and wrenched his feet from the ground, backing away several steps. He spat. "Crazy bitch."

A vein throbbed on her forehead. "This person is inside Konoha. You will find this person and incapacitate him without harming him or shredding off any limbs." She ordered and any more words died on his tongue. "You'll work with a friend of mine, Kakashi Hatake, and when you succeed I'll pay you and you leave with your life." She motioned to and from herself and Kisame. "Do we understand each other?"

He glared hatefully at the clearly threatening woman but nodded once.

"Awesome." She tossed him a shirt Naruto had once worn. "Find him." she turned around and entered the darkness again, seamlessly blending in. Her words echoed after she left, chilling the Akatsuki member to the bone. "You have one week."

"Kami damn it."

**Next time on ****Redlights**

"Who robs a house at eleven in the morning?"

-X-

The boy looked up, not in the least bit fazed by the fact that he had just killed a man, and his eyes narrowed slightly at them, his iris became a bit smaller and took a darker shade of red.

The message was clear.

If the police came then he was going to murder everyone.

**-X-**

"_Orochimaru of the Sannin's fingerprints have been confirmed to be on the letter, boss."_

**Authors note**

**That's all I'm willing to reveal from the next chapter.**

**If you're interested, let me know in a review and the next chapter will be out soon, maybe before New Year. Oh and by the way, I didn't put a ****Next time**** on chapter one because I simply didn't have a chapter two; I didn't expect anyone to like it.**

**I'm tired. Got nothing else to add, so Merry Christmas...again! I hope it was spent well.**

**Let me know what you think of this chapter in a review, would you please, stay safe this holiday, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Sssssssssup guys and gals and thank you all for your encouraging reviews!**

**Shout out to PinkiePieParty122894, anthonym3 (he won't, trust me), Archangel of Order (thank you!), Kurosaki The Hero, (you're feeling might be right, thanks for reading), Darck Master (I can't help it, man. Thanks for the review!), Anime Aikouka, Scandalf (maybe your right, maybe you're not, read to find out. Thanks!), Autistic Weaboo(thanks bud, I appreciate it), daniyelrenato (thank you!), lord 7th (I'm putting my twist on it, yeah. Thanks for your review) and TheForgottenSuns75. You guys are simply spectacular, made my day :)**

**This story isn't just about Naruto's fear but also how he gets over it, or even copes with it. It'll come up every once in a while and it might make him stumble from time to time BUT if you know how I write my stories, you will be entertained by how he picks himself up. This chapter starts off with something most of you, my dear readers, knew happened to Naruto. Some might not like it and you can skip the italics at the beginning and enter the rest of the story. Or you might want to skip it all.**

**If you want to read, there is some mature content inside, lots of blood and death. You have been warned.**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 3

_Not even his dreams were he safe from her._

_He was seven again and she was on top of him._

_Again._

"_Mommy loves you, Naru." She whispered into the boys ear in a voice that gave him chills. She was lying on his right; he tried to curl away from her, weakly pushing her hand off his lower abdomen so he could roll off the bed but she trailed her tongue up his cheek and her iron grip forced him back in place. Her right hand ghosted over his stomach and he whimpered when it teased the top of his underwear. "Don't you know mommy loves you?"_

_He couldn't move._

_Her delicate fingers dipped into his underwear and the red eyed boy cried, his voice echoed but never left the room. He wrenched his eyes away from hers and clenched them shut as dread pooled up in his chest, forcing him down and making him weak against her gentle touch._

_He didn't want this._

_Her breathe was coming out in thin clouds from her mouth as she rubbed him beneath his underwear, taking his squeaks to be that of pleasure and intensifying her carnal ministrations._

_He was weak._

_He was scared._

_Every time she looked at him, every time she touched him, every time she spoke to him; he could not move._

_He begged her to stop, every time she did this. Whispered words laced with dark fear for his life, and unexplainable fear for his life, begging her to leave him alone. She never listened and muffled his words with her mouth-_

Naruto jolted awake with a snort as soon as he heard the quiet sound of metal scraping against the lock of his front door. He groaned sleepily and fell off the couch, content with just lying on the ground and covering his eyes with his left forearm. He hated waking up like this, as this content only lasted for a few short seconds before his dream flooded back to him.

The boy groaned when hurried whispers accompanied the sounds of metal on the door. He tried to shake off his nightmare. His heart was banging in his chest and his head throbbed painfully, still feeling the potent remnants of terror wreck his soul, tearing it to pieces. He fisted his hair and knelt down, focusing his mind on his breathing. Inhaling deeply and exhaling lightly, on and on until he finally heard Ai pulling him back to reality with its words. He fell onto his back and rubbed his eyes to rid them of any tears.

"_It is 11:05AM, boss."_

"Hnnng…what is it?" he asked his computer concerning the noises coming from outside his door.

"_Five armed men are trying to forcefully enter this apartment, sir."_

"Of course they are." Naruto muttered and rolled onto his belly, pushing his face off the ground and saying. "Armed how?"

The small camera on the top of the top whirred and scanned each man outside. _"Kitchen knives…tanto…kunai…and three of them are carrying backpacks. All five men are wearing ski masks, sir."_ The computer watched its master lazily grab his katana and flicked off the sheath, sluggishly moving towards the door with the lethally sharp blade dragging on the ground. He hummed and placed his ear against the door.

"Who robs a house at eleven in the morning?" The red eyed boy whispered. His Yakuza neighbour left her house at eight in the morning to her 'job' and those that did not leave the apartment building in the morning were either conked out with hangovers, still dozing off from drugs or lazy and unemployed. He stayed on the third floor of five floors and there weren't that many reliable places to rob from, so they usually saw the apartment of the boy that was hardly ever around and wore good, clean clothes as a target. Naruto had at least ten robbery attempts in a month, which was small compared to a few other rooms in the very same apartment building. They just didn't learn. If they really wanted to enter then they should at least break down his door, instead of going the stealthy way and picking his lock.

The boy heard the people curse at their inability to pick open a computer controlled, impossible lock Ai could only put in place when its master was inside the apartment. He placed the tip of his blade on his door and listened hard with his head against the door, the blade was about five inches close to his face. His tongue stuck out from the corner of his lips and he slowly dragged the tip down the wooden door about an inch and a half before he pushed hard. The katana slickly cut through the wooden door and stabbed clean through the right shoulder of one of the robbers, who's squealed in pain. The others only had time to blink twice before the silver katana was pulled back into the door of the apartment they were trying to break into, then slid out again and cut through the neck of the same robber he stabbed first.

"What the hell-"

Naruto pulled his blade back inside, ignoring the blood dripping down the weapon, and listened as the robbers turned tail and ran, leaving behind one chocking on his own blood. Blood pooled around him as he gurgled for air, grasping his throat in the vain hope of closing up the wound. The door creaked open and dull red eyes that would haunt any lesser man stood over him. Naruto looked with distaste at the blood under the man's head but still placed the tip of his katana on the dying man's forehead.

"_Cughkk!_" he choked pitifully, hoping for some sort of mercy.

The boy with blood red eyes pushed down his sword, all the while silently staring into the dark brown eyes of the dumb robber. Some people on his floor, mostly those of the lazy and unemployed class, peered out of their rooms and gawked at the scene; a boy with bright green hair standing over a grown man with a sword impaled through his head. The boy looked up, not in the least bit fazed by the fact that he had just killed a man, and his eyes narrowed slightly at them, his iris became a bit smaller and took a darker shade of red.

The message was clear.

If the police came then he was going to murder everyone.

They quietly closed their doors and gave the boy his privacy.

The boy got a good look at his victim; a man that looked to be in his late twenties, wearing a black turtle neck sweater and black pants with black sandals. He looked to have been well funded and that roused the runaway's suspicion; why weren't they using better technology to rob him? Hell, why were they robbing him in the first place? He couldn't have looked like he had much.

Naruto rummaged through the man's pockets and retrieved a few loose change, just a handful of crumpled ryu notes, stashing them into his pants pocket. After further inspection, he found a wallet in his back pocket. He pursed his lips and hummed, standing up and leaving the katana blade sticking out from the dead man's head. He opened the wallet and this time he didn't pick out the money but went straight for the man's identification, of which he had none. The only thing he found was a picture the man had taken with his daughter and son, which Naruto threw away without a second thought, and a handwritten letter from the man's parents. Naruto gathered, from the letter, that the man's name was Chizori and he was a native of Fire country but his parents stayed in Grass country.

Naruto's lips became straight when he saw "Grass country" in the letter.

The boy could still feel sleep tickling at a corner of his mind and he would admit that, due to his frustration at being woken up from his slumber, he had executed this warning kill messily. He could have done it a whole lot cleaner.

This was why the boy read the letter again.

He wiped his hand on his pants, though it wasn't stained with blood, and rubbed his eyes to get the last relics of sleep out.

Reading it for a third time, simply to confirm his alarm, and it was now blaringly clear.

The letter was written in subtle codes.

He briefly wondered how the 'geniuses' that had tried to pick his lock had been able to decipher the coded language but dismissed that thought in favour of reading it through, cracking the codes he knew and assuming what the rest said.

_Boy with red eyes. Find him. Bring him to Sound. Do not make noise. Do not fail._

That was as much as he could translate from the ten lined letter written by Chizori's 'parents'. Naruto took the man's backpack off, idly saying. "Find the other four and keep tabs on them."

"_Yes, sir."_ Ai responded and used Konoha's security cameras to watch the four survivors. Naruto had initially planned to scare any other future robber with his act, not really caring if the others left alive, but now it seemed his secret life would soon be in jeopardy.

Inside the bag, Naruto found a new set of clothes, some packets of food, some bottles of water and a single sealing scroll. Naruto's quick mind correctly assumed that they planned to run off with him as soon as they got him. He frowned imperceptivity and used the sealing scroll the seal away the dead body, using the spare T-shirt to mop up the blood and seal that away as well. Now there was only a noticeable red patch on the ground and that was enough for Naruto, so he picked up his sword, slung the backpack over his right shoulder, of which the letter was crumpled up inside, and he stomped into his apartment room with narrowed eyes.

The door boomed behind him.

The people Orochimaru had hired had mediocre training at best and were only hired hands, not real Sound shinobi, but that was how much the Sannin underestimated him.

He removed the letter from the bag and tossed it onto the six by six foot glass platform in the middle of his living room. "Examine that for Orochimaru's fingerprints." He had collected the missing Sannin's prints during an exploration of a forest east of Konoha two years ago, when he was scouting out from any holes in Konoha's defence he could capitalize on. He found no holes, though he did find a rundown laboratory. Ai, using Naruto's computerized goggles as a focal point, dutifully scanned the entire structure and reported that rot ridden books and a few discarded lab coats had the snake sages name on them. He was also able to get fingerprints and any book he was able to find was immediately scanned into Ai's memory bank. The physical books where then subsequently set on fire while the digital copies were precisely filed away until when Naruto needed them or Ai wanted to use them for reference in a future problem.

Three seconds later, _"Done."_

"And?"

"_Orochimaru of the Sannin's fingerprints have been confirmed to be on the letter, boss."_ The boy hummed and muttered to himself.

"I only wanted to know."

"_Sir?"_

"Confirm whether or not the people Orochimaru sent don't have _direct_ ties with him."

There was a moment of low whirring sounds from the super computer and Ai took pictures it had taken of each of the failed robbers and compared them with that the Konoha Police had in their own database, as well as that of computers in the whole country with security footage._"…Two of them have history in police detention for assault and armed robbery, one is the half-brother to another,"_ the half-brother's picture was connected to one of the robbers that had been in jail. _"That half -brother lives on the fourth floor,"_ which explained how they knew where Naruto lived._ "And the last two have families that are deep in debt in the Fire country capital."_

"How did they get to Konoha?"

"_I…don't know but…a large sum of money was transferred into their account from an account in the country and withdrawn that same day."_ Ai would have asked whether Naruto wanted to know the name on the account that transferred the money but it knew that its creator wouldn't care, and for good reason too; the account was obviously under an alias.

"Orochimaru paid off their debtors and gave them this job." Ai filed this summary its master had proposed away for it to use when a similar situation came up in the future. Naruto scratched his chin and sheathed his blade. "So they aren't connected to the snake. Good."

He had not changed since he came back from work in the brothel's bar, so his short sleeved, button up white shirt and his black slacks were rumpled since he slept in them. Nonetheless, he didn't care much how he looked; he couldn't let the other four to get out of Konoha, even if it was breaking his rule of staying away from daylight as much as possible. So he fixed on his goggles and perched his katana on his left shoulder, undoing his top button and slinging up a single suspender onto his right shoulder. He didn't care if his targets had families; he was going to kill them before they could tell anyone what they knew.

"Where are they?"

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The four, now unfortunate, armed robbers never knew any such terror than what they were experiencing now.

They were running headlong through the red light district on their way outside the entrance gate to the district, making sure that they were in full view of the people. The passing people in the district watched them, full grown men in obvious burglary garb, fleeing for dear life, pelting down the street as fast as their legs could carry them. Their ski masks made it all the more clear that they were coming from a robbery but with how raggedly they were running one didn't need to guess to know that they had failed.

They had limited ninja training; three of them were former genin and one, the half-brother, dropped out of the academy after only a year. Yet what they knew escaped them. The person they had tried to kidnap was much smarter than they thought, smart enough to kill one without even leaving his home. They had been stealing and kidnapping for years now and they knew the warning signs for when a job was simply just too much for them.

This job was too much for them.

One of them yelped in shock as he spied, from the corner of his eyes, a red eyed boy holding a sheathed blade and wearing a black ski mask.

He was gone as soon as he saw him.

"Why the fuck did you accept this job, Koru!" the half-brother that saw the masked boy yelled, too shaken up by what he saw to lower his voice.

"How the hell should I have known this kid could kill?!" the man replied.

"You live in the same apartment, you fucking idiot!" the other half-brother, the ex-convict, shouted back before he grunted when he ran face first into a solid brick wall. He pushed off the wall with wide, horrified eyes, noticing that his three other comrades had face planted into the wall like him.

"How the hell did we get here?!" the last of the four living robbers cried, turning around in a full circle. They were standing at the far end of an alley and, to their absolute horror, across the street from them was the very same apartment building they were running from. "Oh shit-"

Naruto phased into sight behind the curser and his blade appeared again, sheathed deep through the man's back and shooting out his front, impaling his heart. The boy twisted and tore through the human body horizontally to his right, slicing off the upper part of a man's head and kicking the dead body so that it tangled against one of the robbers that was about to run away again. The boy turned around on his heels and threw the blade at the other running robber and the katana sunk deep through the back of the man's neck. The person stumbled and fell down onto his face, gasping and clawing at his neck, where two inches and a half of the dangerously sharp weapon poked out from the front. There was about ten yards of space in the dead end alley and the man had only made it about a yard before he was brought down by the thrown katana. It was all using a simple misdirection genjutsu learnt by most chunin, that made the victim think he was going one way but was in reality going where the attacker wanted them to go.

The boy walked over the two corpses of his first two victims to the man that was screaming for help, trying to pry off the profusely bleeding corpse off him. Tears welled up in his eyes, knowing full well that his ex-convict half-brother was the one he was trapped under.

"Please!" he shouted, waving his hands in front of his face as the ski mask wearing boy with demonically red eyes approached him with clipped, unhesitant steps. The man with Naruto's katana through his neck had stopped struggling and had gotten pale, not moving. "I-I have information!"

The dangerous boy stopped before the man and cocked his head to the side, mild childish curiosity shone through his dark red eyes. He bent down on one knee and muttered. "I'm listening…"

"We were sent by Orochimaru-"

"I know that. Next." The boy interrupted.

"U-U-Uhm…he wants to use you as a hostage. S-so your father would step down as Hokage and kill himself-"

"I could have reached that conclusion myself." Naruto said, bored. "Try again."

"Oh shit…uh…he was going to pawn you off to Shimura Danzo when he's done with you."

The boy raised an eyebrow. "Now that's new…how do you know this?"

"The person that delivered a letter to me-" he made to move so he could bring his backpack around and show Naruto his letter but the boy raised his hand for the man to stop.

"I've already seen it."

"S-So, Uhm, he told me Orochimaru wants to sell you."

The boy raised a sceptical eyebrow and looked at the man disbelievingly. "You're telling me that the messenger pretty much laid out the whole plan to you." Either Orochimaru was arrogant enough to tell his underlings his plans in detail or this man was lying to him, which didn't mean that Naruto wouldn't look into it. The boy's fist snapped forward in a blaze of speed and bounced against the man's forehead with enough strength to elicit a small _crack_-ing sound. He shook his sore fist and watched as the man's eyes rolled up into his head, wincing at the light red mark on his knuckles.

The runaway ended up sealing all of their bodies and weapons into one scroll and burning that scroll, though he still cleaned off their blood from his katana before doing so. He took their backpacks with him in another scroll; just because he was bad at fuinjutsu didn't mean he couldn't use sealing scrolls, with already have the kanji for _Storage_ drawn on it.

He looked out of the alley and across the street to the apartment building he lived in. He double checked to make sure no real ninja was around, then he shot forward in a burst of raw speed and slipped into the building. He had already forgotten about his causal killings and was wondering how he was going to get all of the blood off his clothes.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The door clicked shut and Ai instinctively locked it behind its creator.

The boy blew out a large breath of air and leaned his katana blade near the door, removing the black ski mask he wore and tossing it onto his couch.

Naruto stood close to the panel of glass on the ground where all of the hologram projector lights reflected off and stared at his desk where his gloves were, their backs open and dead from inactivity.

"_Sir, are you ok?"_ Ai inquired and, somewhere in Naruto's mind he was relieved that the super computer was still evolving, seeing as Naruto didn't program in any command for Ai to directly ask about his health. In Ai's complex mind, it thought that its master was affected by the realizations that not only were Konoha ninjas and his mother trying to find him but also Orochimaru of the Sannin and, to a lesser extent, Danzo.

Naruto cleared his throat and nodded solemnly. "I'm…fine, Ai. Thank you. It's that…" he furrowed his eyebrows and scratched his chin. "There's been a change of plans."

"_How so, sir?"_

"Scrap number fifteen and leave only Wind Manipulation." He commanded, referring to the Elemental Manipulation schematics he had Ai pull up hours ago, wanting Fire, Water, Earth and Lightning to be removed, leaving only wind.

A window of opportunity was open for Naruto leave Konoha and he was going to take it. The letters were hand delivered to each of the five individuals earlier that week, so that meant that the messenger was _possibly_ still in Konoha and was aware that the kidnappers moved out that morning to do their job. The messenger would find out that they were dead, because people undoubtedly heard screams from the dead end alley and the news would somehow reach the police, inciting an investigation on the puddles of blood that would ultimately go nowhere. Two days or so later and Orochimaru would send more people and Naruto was going to kill all of them until the right people came for him.

Strong people.

Smart people.

Crafty people.

People he knew would be able to smuggle him out of the village without the village authorities knowing or being able to catch them.

He laid all of this out to Ai and, at that very moment, the computer once again evolved its manner of speaking.

Ai could not disobey its master, though it still futilely objected to the second part of its master's plan.

"_Boss…this is a bad idea."_

**Next time on ****Redlights**

Naruto saw a twinkle from the corner of his eye and he slashed the sheathed katana downwards to his left, clanging dangerously against the glinting long sword that had been thrown at him from the distance. He frowned at the weapon, stabbed into the ground and oozing with a clear white liquid. He tried to remember where he had seen it before.

**-X-**

"Don't you dare touch me." he growled, tears running down from his eyes and his body trembling.

**-X-**

"_Two unidentified ninjas have appeared."_

"Yeah, I see them." Naruto said in a low voice, his red eye fixed on two new red dots that hid on the opposite side of the glade, opposite of Orochimaru. Dutifully, Ai rolled down a list of what it was able to gather from both secret watchers; one had fire affinity while the other, strangely enough, was predominantly made out of nature chakra. They both had incredible chakra control and only the fire affinity watcher had massive reserves. Chakra was concentrated to the persons eyes. This meant the fire affinity guy had a doujutsu.

**-X-**

Orochimaru caught the boy as he passed out in her arms.

**Authors note**

**Not necessarily in that order. If I put anymore it would have spoilt the next chapter.**

**Next chapter has Kisame and Kakashi, and you can probably guess who those two spies were.**

**I've got nothing else to say.**

**Drop a review on what you think of this chapter, stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Happy New Year!**

**Shout out to anthonym3 (right?), PinkiePieParty122894, AscendedHumanity (read below), ReyneWriter (thanks!), Spark681, Darck Master and Autistic Weaboo (my thoughts exactly, thanks for your review). Your all wonderful people :)**

**In this story, Orochimaru will be gender fluid. Any gender he finds convenient he'll use. Don't like, don't read. I'm diving right into this chapter, meaning that the action starts right from the very beginning, so I hope you guys are ready. It's not something I usually do, cuz I prefer a slow heat into a conflict or at least build it up from a previous chapter, but this chapter starts off rough.**

**Are you guys ready?**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 4

_Six days later_

_Thump-Thump-Thud!_

Smoke wafted off Naruto's fist after the three consecutive blows and he blankly stood back. The man he had planted into the wall gaped in horror as his chest pulsed out with blood, he fell onto his knees and Naruto swept aside, allowing the man to fall onto his face. Naruto frowned disapprovingly and shook his hand, sore from the fast paced punches he had previously unleashed.

It was nine in the night and he was in training ground forty one, a training ground that was densely packed with trees and shrubbery, so the chances of him being heard were slim. The boys red eyes turned to the right, away from the last dead victim, and he pulled out his katana from the lower back of another dead Sound shinobi. He led them here and they followed like sheep, not caring that the night was only lit up by the stars in the sky and his 'eternally activated sharingan' eyes made seeing much easier in dim lighting.

The night was his turf and, though they fought him very seriously, they went with him into the dark forest-like training ground so as to blindly accomplish their mission.

They failed his test.

The fifth team had failed his test.

The boy quietly sheathed the sword with a click and placed the sheathed weapon onto his right shoulder, running a mildly frustrated hand through his mint green hair and blowing out a dissatisfied breath. He had to ask the matron for permission to leave and this was really not worth the effort. Sure, the capture teams came at closer intervals and they got stronger with each group but they weren't strong or smart enough for Naruto to trust them to successfully take him out the village.

Naruto saw a twinkle from the corner of his eye and he slashed the sheathed katana downwards to his left, clanging dangerously against the glinting long sword that had been thrown at him from the distance. He frowned at the weapon, stabbed into the ground and oozing with a clear white liquid. He tried to remember where he had seen it before.

Throaty laughter echoed through the training ground and the boy ground his teeth when he heard a slight hissing undertone from the sound.

"You certainly are a curious one, child." Naruto spun on his heel and swirled around towards the voice behind him, slashing his sheathed blade but it was deflected against a pale milk sleeved forearm. The newcomers hand shot forward to grab the boy by his face but Naruto ducked under the swipe and rolled on his backwards thrice, flicking the sheath of his blade off as he did so and rising to his feet into a rigid kenjutsu stance. The person tutted with condescending disapproval, analysing the genius inventor's stance with a sweep of her coal black reptilian eyes. "Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy."

Naruto's eyes bugged out and his knees trembled as he beheld the person standing across from him. "Orochimaru." He breathed, feeling fear and dread start to lock up his limbs and close up his mind. "B-B-B-B-But aren't you-"

The female ran a slender finger on her smooth cheeks and licked her dark purple painted lips, hissing seductively. "One of my many, _many_ faces."

He had three females come after him and they weren't that much of a threat, now it was a Sannin and she came as a woman. The killer intent rolling off the woman made the boy gulp and his hands cramped up, unable to properly hold the blade again. He gulped as she cackled at his petrified fear, eyes wide and nose flaring to get as much air into his system as possible else he would topple off his feet.

"You don't seem that bad. Not as bad as Kabuto keeps telling me." a hand clamped down on his shoulder and, on instinct, the boys elbow snapped back and crushed the persons nose. He then judo flipped his aggressor over his shoulder and leaped back a step as Orochimaru began slithering up to him. He saw that the person he had just beaten was a person with white hair and large glasses. He was shaking off the cobwebs in his head and grunting to his feet with his hand covering his broken nose, feeling it heal under his palm. The Sannin was closing in at a gradual pace, saying with an eyebrow raised, captivated. "Oh, I stand corrected." She disregarded Naruto's fallen weapon and walked over it, licking her lips again and tittering. "I'll have so much fun with you, dear child."

Naruto skipped back twice and grunted as he slammed into a presence. He swiftly avoided the swiping hands that reached to grab him, terror struck that the person had six arms and wore a chillingly cruel grin. He sent a straight kick to his right, right to a person that wanted to grab him again and a pale white person with black dots on his blocked it with his arms crossed before his face, Naruto felt his leg react to the unusually strong block and reared back. Two more people appeared beside the strong boned man, and the horror filled daze the boy was in prevented him from seeing them clearly. He was fighting for every breath of air, grabbing his chest with his sweaty right hand and swinging his other hand around him for the Sound Four and Kimimaro to stay away from him.

Ai was not there with him seeing as he had the super computer stay back in the apartment in case Naruto ever found the right group of kidnappers.

He found them.

…And he was _terrified_.

He saw flashes of red hair and loving purple eyes as Orochimaru slid up close to him, he clenched his teeth and stumbled backwards, raggedly panting. The Sannin quirked up an eyebrow at his expression but lowered herself down, only for Naruto to shoot back up with a strong head butt for the Sannin between her eyebrows.

"Don't you dare touch me." he growled, tears running down from his eyes and his body trembling. Adrenaline spiked but his legs crumpled under him.

The snake lady smoothly overcame the pain and grabbed the boy by his cheeks, towering over him and pouring more and more killer intent from her body and onto the suffering child with a sadistic smile.

Naruto's mouth dropped open and his eyes rolled up into his head.

Orochimaru caught the boy as he passed out in her arms.

She stashed the boy into a large black chest and it was hefted up by the spider-based member of the Sound Four. As they leaped into the treeline towards Hidden Sound, none of them noticed that the sharp edge of Naruto's discarded katana softly pulse with dark purple light and slowly retreat into the darkness of the forest, towards the red light district. The sheath dutifully followed.

Naruto's apartment lit up with dark purple light and the goggle neatly placed on the work desk buzzed briefly with energy. Ai activated itself as soon as its master was incapacitated and the disapproval and a subtle thirst for justice rang through the computers light voice as a clear recording of how Naruto had gone down processed through its vast mind. Ai's defensiveness flared and the purple light dimmed, leaving only the black tinted goggles spinning in thought.

"_Ai…is fully operational."_

Suddenly, all the light went out and several loud clicks resonated through the room. Fifteen minutes later and a midnight black duffle bag shattered Naruto's bedroom window, blasting out into Konoha's night sky. Four fist sized, shadow swaddled cubes flew out after the bag, propelled through the sky with heated gusts of wind.

"_Hang on, boss."_

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_A few minutes later_

_With Orochimaru_

No one could have seen it coming.

The moonless, starlit sky did not reflect its light as it shot its way under the shadows of the foliage. Its hum was covered by the sound of insects in the night.

It didn't use any chakra. 

None whatsoever.

It was practically invisible until it was too late.

The only person in the high ranking Sound ninja procession, led by Kimimaro and flanked behind by Orochimaru, was the boy that was folded up inside the black casket. He felt the soothing feeling of Konoha's barrier passing his body and then the empty, cold shudder of the fresh air outside of the village, shivering and shaking before he jolted awake with a quick, mildly violent shake. His red eyes snapped open as his keen ears heard a buzz from outside his box prison. He blinked his eyes twice and tried to move his arms, grunting tiredly as his body was restrained to only inside the casket. Seal reinforced to keep anyone but Orochimaru from being able open it, making it near impossible for him to open it from the inside.

He could only curl up into a ball and braced for impact as Ai manoeuvred Naruto's katana, sheathing the weapon into the left side of Kimimaro's chest.

The juggernauts wail shook the ground and they were all at alert, surprised to see the deadly blade driven through the heart of their comrade but not seeing who had done it. The box tumbled out of the man's top pair of arms as he fell onto his knees, crashing down onto the high branch he landed on. They were about a hundred feet off the ground on big and tall trees and the chest Naruto was kept in fell down this great height.

He prepared for the wincing groan for when he would land until a wave of air pulsed through the box.

A corner of Naruto's lips curled up and the lid of the chest popped open after a solid, cramped punch above his head. He leaped out of the chest as it bounced on the dry leaves packed under the trees and barely caught a tree branch with his left hand. His heart was thumping loudly in his chest from the adrenaline rush and he pulled himself up onto the branch.

There was no time to rest as the mad Sannin shot down headfirst from the top of the tree, ignoring the fact that Kidomaru could have died if not that his heart was on the other side of his chest. She wore an insane grin. Naruto swallowed thickly and purposely fell down backwards into the pitch blackness of the bottom of the extremely tall trees of the Akasui forest, borderland to Grass country. He had his arms outstretched and his eyes calmly closed. The green haired boys whole body was enveloped in to the darkness and four black cubes blazed from above after him, passing Orochimaru in bursts of wind that was able to surprise the Sannin.

She too entered the darkness under the trees.

"_Wind dagger."_ A high pitched whistle later and Orochimaru barely jumping out of the way, though a sizeable chunk of her right thigh was carved out. Her snake-like eyes adapted to the darkness as she hissed in pain, forcing herself to heal, looking around for the culprit. There was a flash of red and a kunai slid out from her sleeve, slashing at another blast of incredibly sharp wind. She sliced the practically invisible attack in half but her defending hand was shredded beyond recognition. The Sannin forced down the wince expertly and barely fell onto her back in time before a wind dagger impaled her head, only taking with it a few strands of her midnight black hair. A heavy _boom_ sounded in the darkness around her and her eyes caught a shadowy blur fly up into the sky. She licked her lips, very intrigued at the new stunt the Namikaze born had pulled, and yelled to her subordinates, who were scrambling to understand what the hell was happening. "Get him!"

The katana that was visibly weakening the spider summoner ripped itself out of the man's chest and rocketed after the black blur that bolted away from the Sannin. The blur began to drop from the sky and the ninjas blazed towards it.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Naruto felt his boots begin to overheat and he muttered to his Ai goggles. "Power down my boots." He started dropping out of the sky, completing the aerial arc he started from the point he blasted away from the Sannin in desperation. He grit his teeth in effort and opened his arms, spreading out his glove covered fingers as far apart as possible, frantically saying. "Slow down, slow down, slow down, slow down." He sighed in relief as a quick gust of wind from his palms and his feet blew out, preventing him from fully crash landing into the thick darkness of the forest. His feet touched down on a lower branch of a tree and it immediately snapped under his weight. He swore under his breath and landed on his hands and feet on the ground. "Shit."

He looked up and shot forwards.

"Give me a path to the closest town in Waterfall country."

Ai replied in an elated tone. _"Yes, sir."_

The black tinted front of the computer goggles flickered with white light for a moment before the ground under Naruto's feet lit up with soft red light only Naruto could see through his goggles, and the boy pelted down this path on his feet, his arms flying behind him and his head lowered in concentration. He swerved around trees and ran through shrubs, stomping them under his heavy though mobile boots and continuing on at break neck speed, propelled forward with small bursts of wind every ten seconds. Under his super sophisticated goggles his red eyes looked to the top left and he saw a rotating map of the country and a green blip, him, moving along a set path north of the country, the red path, and a number of red dots closing in on him from behind. He didn't feel like counting, so he asked Ai to count for him. "How many are they?"

"_Ten, sir."_

"Can you identify any?" Naruto asked and his right hand closed around his katana blade from behind while his left caught the sheath from his side. His interest was further piqued when he vividly remembered seeing

"_I am only able to identify four, boss."_ Ai collected data from the audio files in the sharp sword and images it was able to take on its way to Naruto. It highlighted the people as he named them off. _"Orochimaru of the Sannin,"_ the red dot at the far back blinked yellow and then returned back to red. _"Kabuto Yakushi, Kisame Hoshigaki and Kakashi Hatake."_

Naruto controlled his reaction to a hate filled curse. The dots looked to be adapting to his chakra-less wind enhanced speed and were getting closer. He was an excellent sensor but the dense nature chakra in the air was too choking for someone like him to comprehend on the fly with these many ninjas after him, so he delegated some of the sensory responsibilities to Ai. This came in handy when he was occupied with other things than sensing threats. Ai was a reliable aid and that was enough. The boy then made his decision. "I can't run from all of them, so I need to take care of as many as I can."

"_Water jutsu incoming."_ Ai warned and the inventor flipped over the tunnelling shark. He could hear Kakashi harshly scolding Kisame for nearly ripping into the boys back and the goggle wearing boy jumped higher up the trees till he was tree hopping. He threw his sheath away and it soared into the night, the boy then shook his now free left hand and seven shuriken wiggled out of his glove. He blindly threw them behind him and he used his eyes to control them as they spread out. The bone user used his right forearm to swipe away a shuriken and-

_BOOOOOOM!_

The explosion threw him off and two of his other Sound comrades. The boys fingers twitched and the other shuriken whirred dangerously towards those that still chased him. Kakashi, eyes wide from what he had just seen, shuriken without seal tags exploding with enough force to take down a small house, spat out a foul curse and ran away from the homing shuriken. The other ninjas that were charred by the bomb seemed to be suffering this as well.

Naruto wasn't surprised when Kisame revealed Samehada and the sentient sword gulped down the spinning bomb, black smoke blew out from its horrifying mouth and it squealed in mild distaste that there was no chakra in the bomb for it to absorb.

"Ai, how long before my destabilizer comes back online?"

"_Two more minutes, sir."_ Naruto's Charka Destabilizer needed five minutes to recharge after each use so as to prevent Ai from not melting from the effort.

Naruto pursed his lips and thought of what he could do to keep the pursing trackers and Sound shinobi from catching him, until he burst into a wide glade five miles from the Fire-Grass country border. Ai had wisely taken the route through Grass country to Waterfall so that any stragglers that went after Naruto were, hopefully, thrown off. The inventor turned around in the air and massive snapping teeth snapped at his face, making the boy flip backwards and land on his hands, pushing back again onto his feet and crossing his computer augmented katana across his chest as Kisame attempted to plant a foot into his chest. Naruto ground his teeth and shoved the man and his weapon back.

"I guess it's too late to say this but I need you to come with me." Kisame grunted with a sharp smirk, holding Samehada to his right, off the ground. A glorious feat of strength that he hoped would intimidate the red eyed child.

"I'd rather die." Naruto spat and threw his sword over his shoulder, where it soared away from him to only kami knows where. Kakashi landed several feet behind Naruto and breathed out a sigh of relief as two bombs went off, taking with it a Sound Four member. The boy moved around and shuffled back so that he could see both of the strong shinobi, seeing Orochimaru's dot linger at the edge of the glade, watching. Kisame looked at the boy and whistled.

"Cool gear, kid." Along with Naruto's white, short sleeved button up shirt and his black pants with purple suspenders, Naruto was also wearing large dark brown boots that went up three inches above his ankles and large brown gloves that went two inches over his wrists. There were also dented silver, segmented plates that rose up from the gloves and boots and reached Naruto's elbows and just under his knees, over his pants, contrasting the colour of the gloves and boots. He looked like he had metal arms and legs with the way he looked and Kisame, suspecting that this boy was closely related to Kushina, was smart not to underestimate him by just his looks, especially with the black tinted, black goggles the boy was wearing over his bright red eyes. "Where'd you get it?"

"None of your business." Was the child's answer and he lowered into a fighting style.

Kakashi chuckled a little with his eye closed into a smile to lessen the palpable tension that surrounded the three of them like a thick cloud. He motioned for Naruto to calm down. "There's no need for violence, Naruto. We just want to get you back home _safely_; your mother is worried sick." Looking at the boy now, he looked nothing like who he thought he knew. The Naruto he knew was always smiling and always happy, curious and ever willing to learn, even if Kushina never let him learn from anyone but herself. This Naruto, the one in the dreaded _Steam Scorpion Fighting Style_ of Whirlpool country, looked like a cornered animal, ready to bite off anyone's head if they got too close. He had shadows under his eyes and he was paler. He looked so very tired and yet so very stubborn.

He really looked like he would preferably take his own life that go back home.

Kakashi began to wonder if he ever really knew Naruto at all. The boy before him frowned and muttered.

"If you attack me, Kakashi, I _will_ kill you." Like how he had killed anyone unfortunate enough to find him and like how he had maimed Kimimaro, Kabuto and Orochimaru. Any person that was going to jeopardize his bid for freedom was going to die and Naruto wouldn't even think much of it.

The Copy ninja knew the boy's genius and that he was trained by The Red Hot Blooded Habanero, Kushina. Naruto could potentially do some damage to him, a prodigy in his own right, but he could not reconcile the fact that Naruto would intentionally hurt him. "You don't mean that."

"…Try me." his sword was damaged from Kisame's kick and he had used up half of his shuriken supplies but he was going to squash these two future threats.

"I warned you." The legendary ninja shrugged and his body disappeared in a blur of speed. Naruto's light red eyes darkened and his irises shrank slightly, watching the masked man and the shark man come at him from both sides. They were coming too fast for him to make the command, so he skipped back twice and faced both hands at them.

"That's my line. _Wind daggers_." Transparent wind knives shot out from his palms and the two ninjas, not knowing the consequences of being in a three foot radius of the wind attacks, dodged by side stepping what they could see. They could not see that at the end of each dagger were sharp currents of wind that followed the tip of the knife. The wind manipulation attack could best be described as an invisible drill that widened from the tip to the base, like a drill, and the base comprised of sharp wind that, if the tip didn't get the target, could potentially fatally scratch the target. Kakashi groaned as his left arm dropped onto the ground with a wet thump, leaving only a stump and a large, missing chunk of his side, while Kisame lost half of his head and most of his right shoulder. The boy could feel the heat from using the wind based attack and poured out three more conical wind dagger attacks at Samehada as the sentient sword attempted to come at him. The weapon swallowed the dangerous blasts of wind and instantly fell onto the ground, writhing in agony. While it could absorb the chakra in a wind attack, rendering it useless, Naruto's wind dagger attacks were completely deadly because it had not chakra to suck out to make harmless, so the daggers in Samehada simply grinded its insides as the pointed tip tunnelled outwards before they lost strength when they didn't get too far. Naruto hummed as he observed the effect of his _only_ wind attack with the gloves. He needed to save this wind based attack under his newly created, personal folder of Elemental Manipulations, under the highest level, so far. "File _Wind Dagger_ under Wind Manipulation: Level Five."

"…_Yes, sir."_ Ai said, awed at what Naruto had done; he took down an A rank and an S rank with a single attack. Kisame was melting into a puddle of water, no doubt weakened by the wind, and his sword, Samehada, silently twitched beside its wielder, forcefully supplying chakra to the man to save his life. Kakashi looked like he was going to pass out from blood loss at any moment from his severed arm. The super computer then said. _"Two unidentified ninjas have appeared."_

"Yeah, I see them." Naruto said in a low voice, his red eye fixed on two new red dots that hid on the opposite side of the glade, opposite of Orochimaru. Dutifully, Ai rolled down a list of what it was able to gather from both secret watchers; one had fire affinity while the other, strangely enough, was predominantly made out of nature chakra. They both had incredible chakra control and only the fire affinity watcher had massive reserves. Chakra was concentrated to the persons eyes and this meant the fire affinity guy had a doujutsu. "I don't care about them, as long as they stay out of my way." Naruto said and he shot another wind dagger at Kisame's head, effectively ripping it apart. He turned to Kakashi and the man's whole body had just finished entering the ground, with his arm. "Damn it."

"_Do you want me to put a bug on him, sir?"_ referring to a small feature Naruto had added to his glove where he would shot out a small black dot-like piece of machinery and this dot would seek out the copy ninja, wherever it was, and attach itself to the man, serving as a spy.

"It would be a waste of a bug. I already have one in Konoha." he answered the loyal computer, seeing the Konoha ninjas red dot blip and beep as it tore towards Konoha. He looked at the Sannin and felt a chill run through him as his eyes made contact. Naruto then ordered, realizing that his phobia of women was more complicated than he initially thought. "Give me a small shock if it looks like I'm about to pass out."

His encounter with the Sannin made him realize that not only was he scared of females but he was absolutely terrified of powerful females, especially if they made physical contact. It would explain why he hadn't fainted when the women in the brothel or his Yakuza neighbour had touched him; he didn't see them as a threat, yet he still feared them. When it came to strong women like his mother then any courage or confidence he managed to scratch up from his gut would leave him. Ai answered affirmatively, understanding why its creator had said so and the conditions before it could shock Naruto back to reality.

That was the only short term cure in case he froze up ever again before a scarily strong woman, of which there were more than plenty on the continent. He didn't like having panic attacks, no one did, and now that he was in the outside world and he would most definitely encounter more people the last thing he wanted was to fall onto the ground in a dead faint.

He faced his eyes on Kisame, at the bloody crater that used to be his head, and contemplated taking Samehada with him. He thought this through for only two seconds before he shook his head; he didn't trust any sentient creature that he did not build himself. Throughout his kidnapping and escape he had not made use of a single drop of chakra and he could mask his smell with that of the forest but the only loose end he could see were the three powerful feeling ninjas hiding in the shadows at the edge of the glade.

He looked at Orochimaru pointedly and then he narrowed his eyes when he saw complete admiration and interest spin in the Sannin's reptilian eyes. She was likely aware that if she came after Naruto at that moment he would shred her body to pieces with a few drill like wind daggers, which meant that she was hesitant of him but he could also read her rapt attention, as her eyes shone in the dark like light bulbs. She retreated backwards as the boy tilted his head to the side and pointed his right palm at her. When the red dot on the flat map of Fire country symbolizing her went backwards to scrap up what was left of the Sound Four and her other subordinates, Naruto dropped his hand and muttered to Ai. "Power down the wind fans on my gloves to conserve power."

He had already used a lot of wind manipulation attacks and it was seriously overheating his inventions. An outline of Naruto's body blinked at the top right corner and his hands were flashing red. The computer mutely complied. The inventor looked to the side of his goggles at the map and hummed at the lack of detail on the map; he had made this map based on physical maps and stories he overheard in the bar, there wasn't much to it. He noticed that Ai began adding details to the forest he was currently in, like common trees, shrubs, height of the trees, density of the nature chakra on the air, animal and insect life in the forest and some other things, rolling it down the other side of the goggles. He sifted through this new input of knowledge from his super computer and nodded in approval at the intricate detail Ai used in storing the information. When he could, the inventor planned to build an artificial satellite or two that would revolve around the planet and constantly feed him data, so he wouldn't ever be caught unaware by anything or anyone. As these plans rushed through the geniuses mind he saw the fading red dots of the Sound shinobi going away from his position.

He didn't know when thirty minutes ran by of him simply standing in place and speaking under his breathe, muffling his lips so that they won't be read. The two watchers patiently spied on him. Naruto, not to their surprise, turned around and stared directly at them for ten long seconds before he said. "Don't follow me."

Ai provided the clear path to Waterfall country for its master and Naruto followed it, speaking in whispers to the computer. "I think I should change _Wind Dagger_ to _Wind Tunnel_ or maybe even _Wind Stake_."

"_Why, sir?"_

"My wind manipulation looks and acts nothing like a dagger but more like a drill."

"_Then why not call it Wind Drill, sir?"_ Ai provided and Naruto shook his head.

"That's already the name of a wind release jutsu and I'm not using chakra," meaning that Naruto wasn't using a wind jutsu but wind manipulation. What he was doing was raw and less refined than anything wind jutsu could do but no less powerful.

"_Ah, I understand."_

"Save it as _Wind Tunnel_ until I think of a better name."

"_Yes, sir."_

The boy leisurely jumped from tree to tree, suppressing his chakra till it could barely be felt in the choking nature chakra around him. "Show me my bag." A green dot, the same colour as the dot that showed him, appeared on the map at the very edge of the country, a few miles north of him. He had all of his possessions inside, the ones that could fit; clothes, shoes, soap, his toothbrush and toothpaste, his towel, his projectors, which were all folded up into ten hand sized cubes, five sets of ten exploding shuriken and five sets of ten exploding kunai, a flat, disk shaped bomb that could level a small town, two tins of coffee, two cups, a plate and a pot, some spoons and lastly was exactly fifty thousand six hundred and twenty ryu of saved money from his-former-job in the brothel. Anything he forgot or couldn't pack, he could buy in Waterfall, on his way up north to Iron country. The bag itself was altered by the boy so that it could be remotely controlled by Ai and him when it became too inconvenient to carry it, such as when he was kidnapped. His damaged sword and sheath were currently on the bag. When he was getting low on money, he would work as a bounty hunter seeing as that seemed to be more lucrative than working on odd jobs.

Naruto broke through the tree tops with a flip and refrained from whooping in pure joy. He inhaled and exhaled deeply, continuing his sprint.

He was free but he couldn't relax. Not yet. "How's my pace, Ai?"

"_You are doing well, boss. Only an hour before you reach Shiruba-Kawa town. Are you tired?"_

"No, I've never been so energetic in my life."

The upgrade Naruto gave Ai concerning its memory and processing speed evolved and the computer said. _"Well done, boss."_

"Thank you, Ai." The boy landed on a strong branch and bolted on. "Gather what you can about Shiruba-Kawa and direct me to the nearest tech store and if they don't have one then we'll find a place to rest for the night and move out to the next town with a tech store in the morning."

"_On it, boss."_ The red eyed boy was ready to build and before the other nations caught wind of his escape from Konoha, he was going to arm himself to the teeth. Konoha had prevented any leak of him running away from the Namikaze mansion for years and this information was possibly leaked out of the village to Orochimaru by an unknown spy, possibly Kabuto. Information was an important commodity and it reached important ears at lightning speed. Countries and villages that were enemies of Konoha would look for him, no doubt about that. Just like how Naruto had hidden under the Leaf's nose for four years and they never caught wind of him, he would hide from the world until he was well and truly ready to come out, and when he did come out he would bring hell with him.

The boy snatched up his duffle bag as he passed it, running on with quick steps to the closest town in Waterfall as he broke through the border of the country. "We start work on my gloves and boots as soon as we get the right supplies. Give me a list of what we need to finish the Combat Gloves and Boots for schematic number thirty seven," the very latest design he had for his gloves and boots. "While you're at it, bring out Satellite schematic number fifteen and show me a list of the things I need to build it."

"_How many satellites, sir?"_ Ai said as it obeyed, showing Naruto a long list of items he needed for the planned for design for his gloves and boots as well as guided the boy through the night towards the town. The gloves and boots idea also comprised of Naruto's latest drawing of his Elemental Manipulations. There was a lot going on in Naruto's goggles, and in his mind, and it was enough to dizzy anyone not used to being constantly busy.

Naruto hummed with his lips pursed. "Two…for now."

"_Alright, sir."_

"Good." the genius said in a quiet voice and divided his attention between improving his latest design for his satellites and running on the red, lit up path Ai provided for him. For him, multitasking like this was a gift he acquired from years of practise.

One thing Naruto excelled in, besides engineering and mechanics, was hiding. Most of the countries of the planet were after his head, his blood, his body and/or his sperm and that made hiding harder.

Naruto disappeared into the night and it would take the world three months before they found him again.

**Next time on Redlights**

Kushina's hands itched to just…wring out the life from Kakashi's body, squeeze his neck until his throat popped, his lungs collapsed and he shit in his pants. She tucked away a stubborn strand of red hair over her ear and said, her now black painted lips frowning lightly, so lightly that it didn't make a single wrinkle on the redheads porcelain pale, beautiful face.

**-X-**

"Am I the only one that saw my son's genius? Am I the only one…" she placed a hand over her heart and sighed, closing her eyes and shaking her head forlornly. "Am I the only one…that saw this coming?"

**-X-**

The boy felt a smile tug onto his lips when he saw the S rank sections of the bingo book.

**-X-**

Naruto would be a great asset to the Akatsuki.

The Leader of the Akatsuki hummed and said. "Do we know where he is?"

**Authors note**

**So he's out of Konoha. Hurray!**

**I don't think Orochimaru would just let him go. I'm just saying. Then there's the Akatsuki, Konoha and Kushina (because the reasons Konoha want Naruto back are entirely different from the reasons Kushina wants him back). Most of the world is looking for him.**

**My question is…how is the story so far?**

**Drop a review on what you though if this chapter, stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I would see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Sup guys and gals and thanks for all your reviews.**

**Shout out to anthonym3, PinkiePieParty122894, Darck Master, Cboylan, H3llion, lord 7th and shinobinoyami16. Your all wonderful :)**

**Admittedly I haven't been as active as I wanted to when it comes to writing ff **_**and**_** posting them. In all honesty, ff was the very last thing on my mind at the moment. I've got new stories lined up but something with school comes up and I forget about it completely because the things I do take up most of the space in my mind and ff is usually forgotten somewhere. Some other stuff happened alongside school and it slowed me down, yet again. My point is, I'm putting publishing ff on hold for a month or two, until the end of the semester.**

**This chapter won't have a ****Next time**** but it will have a side story.**

**Enjoy.**

CHAPTER 5

Kushina Uzumaki tutted with a straight face as she leisurely walked at the foot of Kakashi's hospital bed. "Excuses, excuses…excuses…" the copy ninja swallowed at her gradually darkening tone and forced himself to stay upright in her presence; despite the painkillers he had taken and the successful surgery to fix his arm back, he could not help but feel like a speck of dust in this woman's presence. She shook her head in disappointment, after hearing the detailed report on his failed mission to retrieve Naruto. She lightly waved her right hand by her ear and cocked her head to the side in faux confusion. "All I'm hearing…are excuses…"

The room was choked full with the woman's special brand of killer intent; dark red air, invisible to the naked eye but very much aware to sensors of all kinds, ebbed from the woman's calm body, like a deadly mist of chakra that, when inhaled, would burn the victim from the inside-out. This air did not thin out too much as it went around the room, creating nightmarish creatures hidden behind the woman's controlled mind, showing images of what she truly wanted to do to Kakashi if not for the fact that anyone outside would hear the man's screams for mercy. Her red hair remained straight and neat, tied up in a ponytail and she was fully garbed in her ninja gear but the copy ninja, in spite of all of his accolades, could not hold down the chill running up his spine as her purple gaze turned to him and the turned up in a smile.

"All you giving me…are excuses…" she looked genuinely confused as she said this and her eyes closed, as if she was trying to understand something. "It was simple really…track my son down with Kisame and bring him back safely…that's all you had to do…" her eyes opened and there might as well have been horns on her head and fire spinning around her feet, for the woman smiled at him with such warmth and motherly joy that the killer intent increased. "Why did you come back Kakashi…after fucking up so badly…?"

"M-M-My arm-"

"Who cares about your arm? What about _my son_?" she said, stopping at the foot of his bed and narrowing her eyes in a slight glare. "Am I the only one that sees my son's genius? Am I the only one…" she placed a hand over her heart and sighed, closing her eyes and shaking her head forlornly. "Am I the only one…that saw this coming?"

Kakashi's shaken mind tried to process what Kushina had said; she knew Naruto was not just an all-round genius but also a tech genius?

Unknown to him, Kushina knew of the boy's hobby of reading about all things electronic, engineering and mechanics, but she just hadn't seen him build anything. Her precious child had powered through fifteen editions of an engineering textbooks used by _Snow country_ _professors_ to teach advanced classes when he was only six. She didn't teach him sealing so that he wouldn't hide anything from her but she knew he was still able to hide things from her and no matter how hard she searched she could never find anything. One simply did not read that much on inventing technology and did apply the knowledge somewhere.

The people stationed to guard Naruto couldn't care less about the boy and mechanically did what they were ordered to do by Kushina, though Naruto was still able to slip past them time and time again.

The night he had escaped she was returning from a mission in Wind country.

She made sure that Minato removed Naruto's guards from the shinobi force and removed and benefit they should have been enjoying from leaving the ninja force. She was still not content with their mistake, so she lured them outside of the village and slaughtered them all, making it all look like a group suicide.

Their deaths had been ruled as suicide and Minato suspected his wife of being involved for only a few short minutes before his mind was dragged back to his office.

Kushina's hands itched to just…wring out the life from Kakashi's body, squeeze his neck until his throat popped, his lungs collapsed and he shit in his pants. She tucked away a stubborn strand of red hair over her ear and said, her now black painted lips frowning lightly, so lightly that it didn't make a single wrinkle on the redheads porcelain pale, beautiful face.

"I'm not surprised Kisame is dead; he can't hold a candle to my boy but I expected more from you, _Copy Ninja Kakashi_," she said in a mocking tone. "Prodigy my ass. You thought you knew my boy and underestimated him because he's a child and here you are, out of commission."

The man cleared his throat. His pride couldn't take anymore of her insults. "If you knew this would happen then why didn't you go after him." he pushed away her killer intent and sat forward, his eye curled up in a smile and his tone tittering. "Is it because you know he'll mop the floor with you."

He suddenly found her right hand around his neck and his body forced down under the weight of her heavy, suffocating killer intent. Her eyes changed to dark red and vulpine and her already sharp canines protruded down her upper lips about half an inch. Her face was twisted to look like some sort of devilish creature that had crawled out from the pits of Yomi. Her fox whiskers thickened as she forcefully summoned more and more of her unwilling tenants chakra and yet Kakashi could not sense even a drop come outside or a dark change in her tone. "Watch your tone, Hatake. I'll say this once and only one…never speak to me like that again. Do you understand?"

"_Ack_! Yes! I-_caaaggck_-I understand."

She released his neck and her features smoothed out once again. Her face lit up like the moon and she was back to being Konoha's most beautiful woman, sharing that spot with her long time best friend, Mikoto Uchiha. "Good. I can't go and get him myself because he'll be able to sense me from a mile away." This fact bewildered the man, for he could catch a whiff of her chakra and she was standing right there at his side. "He's wonderful like that. I trained him myself, remember, are you surprised?"

He coughed and inched away from her. "…No."

She placed her hands on her hips and turned around. "Tsume will come by in a few hours to ask you for any information on your _disastrously_ failed retrieval mission. Give her all she needs about Naruto and where he went. Understood?"

He stared at her back distastefully and then answered. "…Understood."

She left his hospital room with a plan.

Kakashi's retrieval mission wasn't a complete bust; not only does she now know where her precious boy was heading to and knew a small taste of what he could truly do but the tracking seal she placed on Minato's former student had picked up plenty of Naruto's chakra before the man retreated with his dismembered arm. She had retrieved her seal from Kakashi, when she grabbed his neck, and now that she had a good lock on his chakra she would use the seal as a beacon to follow him to where he was exactly, or until he found a technique that would mask his presence from even her level eight seal. Tsume would use that seal to track her boy.

The problem was that Naruto could truly sense Kushina before she could make her appearance; she had only been able to sneak up on him within the house because they nearly always had visitors at the Hokage's mansion, foreign diplomats and people from the village, so there was chakra in the air that could choke any sensor. Past Hokage's presences dwindled, even after their passing, and Kushina had taught her son how to 'turn off' his senses. This was so that the chakra in the air would overload his brain.

Naruto was weakest while in the mansion because of this.

Except inside the mansion, the boy constantly had his senses on red alert.

Being part Uchiha and part Namikaze gave him hyper senses, which was simply and extreme awareness of Naruto's own presence in the world as well as those in his immediate surroundings, their smell, the sounds and, sometimes, the taste. Tsunade had said that his 'eternally activated sharingan' eyes were a by-product Minato's and Mikoto's genes merging and this was the extent of her understanding for the blonde boy's rapid mental development.

The shinobi IQ test Naruto had taken, his score being higher than two hundred and fifty, doubled up as a Nara heirs rite of passage before they could officially become clan heads. It was just about over Shikaku's score and well over Shikaku's grandfather's score.

Kushina couldn't be any prouder. She and her best friend began making plans right then and there, in the Intelligence Evaluation Centre of the Ninja Academy, of how to celebrate the boys amazing results. Mikoto had proposed they throw a private, reserved party in an Uchiha restaurant, her treat.

What they later discovered, when she and Mikoto and her were pulled out of the classroom and away from Naruto by the moderator, Inoichi Yamanaka, was that the seven year old boy had the mental age of a seventeen year old jounin. He advised them to watch the boy carefully for any strange change of behaviour from that point on. There weren't any changes. Naruto still smiled brightly and spoke politely, like how she knew he would.

Now, thinking back on it, her son wasn't happy, not if he ran away from her.

He wore a mask.

She perched her thumb and left pointer finger under her chin in thought, making a few intrigued people watch her pass them on the streets, on the way to the Inuzuka clan compound.

Why wasn't Naruto happy?

Maybe she didn't show him enough of her love.

Her hand clenched into a resolute fist and determined fire ignited in her eyes. _'When Naru comes back, I'll make sure to show him more and more of my love.'_

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_05:02AM_

_Shiruba Kawa town_

_Waterfall country_

Naruto saved his work on his super computers database and pushed up his goggles as he stopped at the humble gate of his target town. The place looked properly funded and this was because it was the home town of the current Waterfall daimyo. The man had worked as an apprentice plumber before he caught the eye of the then Waterfall country Princess and they started going out, and as usual her parents were less than happy. Long story short, the current daimyo managed to convince the then daimyo that he could protect his daughter. The wedding had been held in Shiruba Kawa town.

The inventor felt the cold air pass him and he nodded to the old, barely awake gatekeeper, the man looked a whisper away from death, so the boy didn't need to creep by but instinctively gave the man a customary nod of greeting. He rubbed his hands together and blew into his cupped hands; Ai looked at her creator worriedly. Naruto had taken off his gloves because they were constantly overheating too quickly, leaving him with just his large, clunky boots that had dented silver segments rising up from inside the shoes to a bit under his knees. Naruto walked to the side of a building, a tall apartment complex that was painted soft blue and hardly had any lights on, and he dropped his bag. It was too early for the sun to be coming up and too early for anyone to be going about any mundane, daily activity, so the gravelly streets were well illuminated with street lamps and devoid of life or even filth. The boy rummaged through his bag, snapping up his suspenders when he noticed, for the first time since Orochimaru kidnapped him in Konoha, that they weren't in place. He heaved a sigh and pulled out a baggy dark purple hoodie with comfortable black sleeves and the picture of a swaying blue tree on his back. He wore it and allowed himself to heave a relieved sigh at the warmth that poured through his body, contrasting the thick cold that went through the village. He had scored this hoodie from second-hand store close to the brothel during his first winter and he had been using it ever since, even though it was three years before he applied to work the bar in the brothel.

Next, he brought out the black ski mask he had taken from the dumb criminal he had killed in Konoha, the first set of disappointing kidnappers. He put it on his head and pulled it down so that his ears were warmly tucked under the mask and his hair was stuffed inside, though a bang escaped the mask that Naruto didn't bother to put back which hung above his right eye, but he didn't cover his face with the ski mask; the last thing he wanted was for anyone to think he was harmful. He brought down his sophisticated computer goggles to hang on his neck and lastly put on a pair of black gloves with dark purple palms.

He closed his hands into tight fists. He was ready.

He checked his gloves inside his duffle bag, in their folded, black cube-like form, and then he zipped his bag up and picked it back up. His katana was jammed through a belt loop to his left, leaving his left hand free, so he riffled through his left pocket and brought out a pair of black, wireless headpieces. He placed them in his ears and muttered.

"Still there, Ai?"

"_Yes, sir."_

He nodded and walked away from the side of the building and deeper into the fairly large town. He had designed those headpieces in case he wanted to speak to Ai and there was a risk of people hearing when he didn't want anyone else to hear. His hoodie hid the blue devices in his ears as he trooped down the street, under the lamps. He had to walk for a few long minutes before he found one of his many target shops.

_Shinoue Shinobi Weapons Store_.

The sign at the door then turned open as he prepared to knock.

A bell tinkered above his head.

The attendant, who was distractedly sweeping the front section of the large store, jolted back as he heard the bell. He was a brown haired boy, probably sixteen years of age, wearing a thick, brown work apron over a black sleeveless vest and brown pants. His displeasure at discovering that it was a kid that had interrupted his work showed. "You lost or something?"

"No," the boy answered as he looked around the large interior of the store. There were shelves and shelves of weapons and basic supplies of an average ninja. The shelves nearest to the checkout counter had several scrolls and books detailing jutsu, fighting style and literature written by veterans on a variety of subjects. There were more scrolls on a separate part of those shelves clearly named _Sealing Scrolls_. Another side of the store had gleaming sets of repair kit and weapons maintenance kit, which were neatly kept in rectangular boxes, of which Naruto picked up one of each and dropped them at the counter with two sealing scrolls. "I would also like to buy a bingo book, the latest edition, please."

The teen didn't seem too convinced. He stomped away from the display screen to the counter and glared at Naruto, who was too busy sifting through the shelves of books and scrolls. "What's a kid like you gonna do with repair and maintenance kits?"

The boy answered, like he had not heard the snide words from the older boy. "How much would they be?"

The attendant barked. "Hey, I just asked you a quest-"

"I'm in a hurry." Naruto said, dropping a book he had been looking through back on the shelf and turning to the counter, tapping his finger on it in annoyance. "Either you tell me the price or I take my business elsewhere."

The older teen ground his teeth and slapped the current edition of the bingo book onto the table, sliding it to Naruto with his other purchases. "That would be a thousand three hundred ryu; four hundred for each of the kits, two hundred for the book and three hundred for the sealing scrolls."

The boy rummaged through the pockets of his black shorts and brought out two five hundred ryu notes, sending a waning smile to the irritated teen. "Thank you."

He couldn't use sealing right there and his duffle bag was already too full, so the boy stacked up the kits and placed the book and scrolls between them. He balanced the boxes in his hands and looked around as he exited the store, his eyes lit up and he entered an alley that was yet to be brightened up by the rising sun. Naruto dropped the kits and opened his duffle bag, replacing his older repair and maintenance kits with the new ones and setting the older ones on fire.

He held up the bingo book up to his computer goggles and quickly flipped through them.

"Got that?"

Ai buzzed as the images and words that had finished flipping before its goggles slowed down in its mind. It clearly read each of the seventy two entries of the Waterfall country bingo book and stored them in a new folder. It answered its master five seconds later. _"…Yes, sir."_

Naruto's eyebrows quirked up, impressed; his computers was adapting well to the increased processing speed. He raised the book up this eyes and read through it, murmuring under his breathe after each entry. He might not have photographic memory but he had an astounding memory all the same, and he saw the clear distinction between E rank missing ninjas and S rank missing ninjas.

The Waterfall country bingo book was not just a compilation of the country's enemies and missing ninjas but also that of its allies enemies and missing ninjas. It cut across borders to include Kumo missing ninjas but at the same time Konoha nuke nin and Suna wanted men and woman. While the D to E rank sections mostly had to do with ninja academy drop outs, ninja wannabes and civilian gangbangers; they didn't pose that much of a threat and as such their bounties were not that much higher than a thousand ryu. The reason they were even named was because of their heinous acts and the fact that they were still not able to be caught, not because of their prowess in fighting. The A to C ranks were the group of ninjas that got some of Naruto's attention; they were the ones with monikers and bloody reputations after their names. They not only betrayed their country but also performed bad deeds during their time as missing ninjas, adding what the country discovered when that ninja was still under their employ. Some were evenly balanced out in their abilities but others worked their best aspect and gave it their signature application, like a C rank kenjutsu user from Kumo or a B rank puppet user from Suna.

The boy felt a smile tug onto his lips when he saw the S rank sections of the bingo book.

You could say that killing Kisame, the Zero Tailed Beast, and tearing off one of Kakashi Hatake, the Copy Ninja, with only one _Wind Tunnel_ each gave him some confidence in his inventions. He couldn't allow this to overcome him seeing as he didn't actually match them in hand-to-hand, his sword or his ninjutsu and only with his Level Five wind manipulation that he had removed every limiter, which would explain why his gloves easily heated up.

When he was nine, his mother had judged his taijutsu to be low jounin and now four years after that he was fairly sure that his fighting technique was more refined. Though this didn't mean he could face an S rank with hand-to-hand alone and live to tell the tale. Yes, D and E ranks were too weak for him, that much was obvious, and maybe even B and C ranks too, but he was going to work through twenty A ranks before he would think he was ready for an S rank, and that would only be when he was in need of their bounty. He threw the bingo book into the small fire and watched the dark purple fire crackle with his burning red eyes.

If he made proper use of a Henge and brought in the missing ninjas to any of Waterfall country's patrol towers then they wouldn't really dig that deep into his background, seeing as there were dozens of freelance ninjas that weren't allied to any particular nation or village. He needed to space out how many times he brought in a missing ninja and to different patrol towers of different hidden villages so as not to gain attention from the villages.

The red eyed boy exited the alley as he stuffed a sealing scroll into his pants pocket and went further into the town to find a tech store.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_The Amekage's tower_

_Ameagakure no Sato_

The meeting room was silent.

No one dared speak.

The god of Ame sat on his throne his thin red hair hanging over the right side of his face and his powerful red eyes shining ominously. He perched his right hand on the armrest of his throne and placed his chin between his thumb and pointer finger, his mouth turned down in a terse frown.

A purple haired beauty stood to his right and her face was devoid of emotion. She had a black piercing on her bottom lip and through her ears, and like every other person in the room she wore a black cloak with red clouds, fully closed up and with a high collar that reached her nose. Her dark brown eyes roved from left to right, reading the mood of each member from their varied expressions; Sasori had an invisible, wooden smile on his lips but his dark brown eyes were lowered in respect, Diedara's face was twisted in anger and his hands knuckles were white, Kakuzu's arms were crossed and, like his partner, Hidan, his head was tilted up and his eyes were unreadable, Hidan's eyes were closed and a bright smile danced on his lips, his chest rumbled with a quiet goggle every once in a while, Itachi was stoic and silent, as unmoving as a rock, Tobi sniffed and his head was lowered and Zetsus black and white face wrinkled with a deep frown.

Nagato didn't look so pleased.

How could he have known that the Namikaze kid could have been that strong?

The boy was an unknown and was considered less than a threat so Zetsu didn't bother keeping tabs on the red eyed part Uchiha. Kushina too wasn't that important since the woman's locations were usually, when she wasn't on a mission, known by the Hokage's personal staff, so she too wasn't under surveillance.

Who could have known that Naruto would one-shot Kisame and Kakashi at the same?

Tobi would have stepped in the noticed anything wrong but it had all happened too quickly.

They were still in the fund collection phase of their plan and the money Kushina intended to pay Kisame for the completion of the mission would have set them off for what they wanted to use it for. The shark man had asked Zetsu to help him locate the boy and the plant creature couldn't find a single trace of Naruto that would directly lead him back to the runaway. It ended up being Orochimaru, a former member of the rogue organization, that led them to the boy when Kakashi and Kisame were noticing a small influx of unknown ninjas into the village.

Kisame's death was a great loss to the organization, the S ranked Kiri missing ninja was the top five strongest in the room, in Nagato's opinion, but one thing stood above everything in this situation.

Naruto would be a great asset to the Akatsuki.

The Leader of the Akatsuki hummed and said. "Do we know where he is?"

Zetsu was hesitant to answer. "_…__**No**__…_"

Nagato wasn't surprised by that answer. Zetsu had gathered as much information on Naruto as possible after Kisame was killed; the boy had successfully stayed under the radar for four straight years, meaning that that was the only thing Zetsu could find about the boy.

Naruto was a remarkable child.

He created his own wind based attack and that attack didn't make use of a single drop of chakra, not even a sliver, and that made the wind attack a little bit less refined and packed with pent up, raw wind power. If Tobi and Zetsu hadn't seen it for themselves they wouldn't have believed it.

"He has to be found and convinced to join the Akatsuki." Nagato rumbled and his purple rinnegan flicked to Diedara as the mad bombers head twitched with irritation. "Is there a problem, Diedara?"

"Why do we need that little Namikaze shit anyway?" he spat venomously, glaring downwards and making sure his eyes were not looking directly on the fear inspiring eyes of his leader. "One Konoha ninja is more than enough." Here he shot a hate filled look at the ever impassive Itachi.

"…The Akatsuki is down one member and there are no other worthy S ranks around. Naruto is the only logical choice-"

Diedara interjected with angry, blood shot eyes. "How could some shit head Namikaze one-shot Kisame and Kakashi?" his voice echoed around the deathly silent meeting room. Sasori didn't bother trying to shut his partner up; he wanted to see how their leader was going to kill Diedara anyway. "Kisame is a motherfucking S rank. That kid is a motherfucking _nobody_." He made sure not to raise his voice but his grating rage reverberated through the room.

Zetsu cleared his throat and cut the tense silence by saying, "_I __**saw it**__ with m__**y own **__ey__**es**_-"

"Well you saw wrong." The irate blonde scoffed.

Nagato squashed his annoyance and sat forward on his throne, making the others lean away from him and Diedara to clamp his mouth shut. The bomber submissively lowered his head and frowned to himself. "Sasori…Diedara…I want you to try and convince the boy to join us. If he disagrees then capture and bring him back here, to Ame. Use lethal force if you have to and retreat if you must." He pointedly stared at the living puppet and the man serenely stared back, unafraid. The silent message was passed between them and the older, more professional of the pair nodded in understanding at the unsaid words of the leader; drag Diedara back alive when the situation became too hairy. He had initially wanted to send Tobi to recruit the boy, wherever he was. He wanted sense to be beaten into Diedara's head but, just to make sure, he said to Itachi. "Support them."

"Ok." Was the Uchiha's simple response.

"If you can't convince him then hypnotize him."

Three S ranks were now on his tail and they were not going to go easy on him if he resisted.

The god of Ame's plan wouldn't fail.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_10:11AM_

_Waterfall country_

The country wasn't called Waterfall country for nothing; there were a total of thirty nine waterfalls in the region, the most in any other place on the continent, and the biggest waterfall hid the massive, developed cave called Hidden Waterfall village.

Ten miles north east of Shiruba-Kawa town were a range of waterfalls, about seven in number, and all of them were stacked on top of each other. It was considered the most dangerous place in the country because of how strong the water currents flowed from the first waterfall at the top down the very last, which was able to strip flesh from bone. No one was keen on traversing these falls and so several signs were placed around the place to ward off any person curious enough to go near them. The series of falls were incredibly high, so there was plenty of mist at the bottom and the water life were specifically adapted to survive the strong water currents.

It was a private spot and no one would expect a thirteen year old boy to go near there, which was exactly why Naruto hid inside the single cave behind the top second waterfall.

It would have to do for a little while.

Naruto gave himself two weeks before he moved to another destination.

There was a loud boom from outside the cave and a circle of water opened. Naruto quickly flew through it and skidded to a stop after three steps. The water behind him kept falling down normally soon after the circle closed after Naruto. His boots slightly smoked with white vapour from hot wind and water and he grunted as he dropped a burlap sack onto the ground heavily. Leaves, twigs, broken branches and a few loose piece of clothing he had found in the forest around the seven waterfalls tumbled out from the mouth of the sack and the boy swiped his forehead with the back of his large technical gloves with a sigh. His bright red eyes looked around the cave, only being lit up by small pulsing light coming from his computer goggles, placed on his duffle bag, which was at the far back of the apartment sized cave. He was still in his warm hoodie, his ski mask was still on his head and his gloves were still on his hands.

The boy arranged the leaves on the ground into a large mound and knelt down beside it with a matchbox in his hand. He struck a matchstick and threw it into the stack of leaves and wood, gently blowing into it to get it to catch fire. He rubbed is eyes and coughed when the smoke rose up and almost filled the cave, if not for three small fans Naruto had the foresight to set close to the fire pushing the smoke out of the cave and into the water powerfully falling down outside. No one could see the smoke or even the change of colour due to the speed and overpowering nature of the water. He didn't want to use a _Campfire technique_ because it used chakra and chakra could be detected. The fans whirred gently and the boy got off his knees, slipping off his gloves and boots and neatly placing them about two feet away from the fire, palms down and boots upright.

Leaning against his duffle bag was a new backpack he bought during his time in town. He lifted the bag up and carried it towards the fire, dropping it and unzipping it. The boy then began to patiently, slowly place all of his purchases for that day on the ground, around the fire, shuffling here and there and scratching his chin with each item he dropped.

"Turn off that light, Ai."

"_Sure, boss."_ The light from his goggles flicked off and Naruto asked.

"Check again if I got everything."

For the third time, Ai scrolled through the list of tools and items Naruto needed to make a better, more advanced pair of gloves and boots. A sharp beam of light shot out from the goggles and swept over the things around the warm fire, not taking Naruto into too much regard as it roved back and forth twice. _"Everything is here, sir."_

"Perfect." His eyes sparkled with bubbling excitement as he saw the great quality tech he bought with his money; some mobile phones, a solder, extra thin wires, four CPUs, an array of tiny screws and screwdrivers, a large stack of metal plates, a plain white half face mask, a pack of spray paint, three packs of large and small light bulbs each, ten laser pointers, five speakers, five magnets, thick work gloves, a few leather bags, a bottle of hair dye, a guide book of Waterfall country and a detailed map of the country. These were the things he couldn't get in Konoha without going to a reputable store, thus getting sighted. He had to stick to low quality and that was why his gloves always malfunctioned when he used them too much. The store clerk was surprised that a Henge'd version of him wanted to buy so much and Naruto ensured to use his haggling skills to drop the total price of thirty six thousand, five hundred ryu to thirty thousand ryu. His eyebrows lowered in thought and he mumbled. "I've got twenty thousand, six hundred and twenty ryu left huh…"

"_That is correct, sir."_

He walked to his goggles and put them on. "Alright. Show me my gloves." The image of Naruto's latest design for his gloves came before his red eyes; he didn't have the time to set up his projectors to make building his tech easier but nothing was ever easy for him. The image displayed by Ai still looked technical and as if it was projected before him, so the genius boy used his hands to expand and swipe from left to right, examining it once more to make sure he didn't miss anything, no mistakes. He wanted as little retries and failures as possible. "Let me know when it's four in the afternoon, ok?"

"_Of course, sir."_ Ai still didn't approve of Naruto's work ethic, knowing that its creator wanted to work for six hour straight on his gloves but it was glad that Naruto wasn't as tense as he was in Konoha. His only hurry was to relocate from place to place. Naruto was a bit more relaxed and so Ai didn't have much to complain about. _"Do you also want me to keep up my Sensory Field?"_

"Sure, I only want to see schematics for my glove, so you won't use that much power." Naruto answered and trudged to the fire, picking up a mobile phone and popping the battery out from the back. Ai's Sensory Field was a sphere of invisible energy coming from Naruto's goggles to detect any living creature within a five mile radius. It sensed chakra of all kinds as well as warmth and heart beats. Keeping this field operational twenty four seven took a bit out of Ai's processing speed, especially when it was away from its primary source of power, the sun, so Naruto only turned this field on when his guard was low, meaning when he was sleeping or deep at work in his projects. The base design for his planned gloves blipped with parts he needed and the boy craftily assembled them together, his eyes twitching from one side to the other and his hands a blur of activity.

It was hard working on a project with only a fire as a source of light but his fiery red eyes were gradually growing accustomed to the poor visibility.

"Use my sword to bring over my repair and maintenance kits." Naruto suddenly said after two long hours of pure, single minded, blazing work. Off by the duffle bag, Naruto's sheathed katana levitated off the ground and the it's pointed side gently ran through the handles of the two kits Naruto was talking about. It tilted itself back and the kits slid down the sheath and the sword floated to Naruto, where Naruto swiped them off the blade, muttering his thanks to his computer companion, and went back to his project. Ai watched on, completely fascinated at how smoothly its master went about the cave, as if his mind knew, five steps ahead, what to do and how to do it. Naruto over planned so as to reduce the risk of failure, which was why he quadruple checked his glove and boots schematics before he even had the tools to invent them, but it wasn't only that; there was this air of comfort and peace about Naruto as he sailed around the fire, picking and dropping items and rounding back to where he was building a fresh pair of gloves. He knew what he was doing and Ai felt deep pride that it was able to witness its masters genius and even more pride to be able to serve its master.

Ai was an artificially intelligent life form made up of complex set of numbers and an even more dizzying set of codes no one but Naruto could ever _hope_ to comprehend but it was still, with each subsequent evolution, gradually gaining more sentience and understanding of the world. Emotions felt foreign and new to her, though there was always a deep seated adoration for her master that had been spinning in the computers mind since it had first awakened. The computers biggest fear, it realized then and there as it marvelled at Naruto's determination, was that Naruto wouldn't have a need for it anymore. Its creator was smarter and wiser and soon it would be replaced by a better Ai computer, like how Naruto was replacing his gloves with a much better version.

Ai didn't feel the dread of fear for being turned off.

No.

It felt a small dip in its emotion at the thought of Naruto discarding it for something else.

Ai was about to resolve itself to be useful to Naruto until he had no more use for it until the red eyed boy, not sensing the internal turmoil of his digital companion, breathed out and his lips quirked down in concentration, twirling a small screwdriver in his right hand and kneeling over a small, carefully built motherboard, said.

"Ai."

"…_Boss?"_ Ai answered after a pause.

"Remind me to upgrade you when I wake up from my evening nap."

Ai's mood lifted a tiny bit. _"Yes, sir."_

Naruto had no intention of replacing Ai with anything else and this reminder proved it; the boy would continue to upgrade his computer until Ai could do the upgrades itself. He took off his gloves.

Naruto connected two wires to the bottom of the motherboard and soldered them in place, looking at them with squinted, expert eyes. He pursed his lips and blew them to get any dust off and held the three by three inch motherboard with his thumbs and pointer fingers at each opposite corner. The ends of the wires were connected to the bottom left side of his goggles. He braced himself and said.

"Give it some power."

Five red lights on the small board beeped on, one light for each left finger.

Naruto's eyebrows slowly lifted up his forehead and entered his hairline in anticipation, until-

_BANG!_

Four of the lights exploded, leaving only the light for his left thumb on the motherboard. Naruto chuckled lightly and coughed away the smoke, waving his right hand over his face and rubbing off the soot on his cheeks. Ai relished Naruto's minor amusement. "That went better than I expected." He dropped the board and cracked his knuckles to make sure his hands weren't damaged. He rolled his neck and pulled up the sleeves of his purple hoodie, hunched his shoulders over the board and muttered. "Let's try this again."

**Authors note**

**Instead of a ****Next Time**** I have a ****Side story**** to fill in the gap o why Naruto didn't simply allow Orochimaru to take him to Sound and why Naruto wouldn't have stayed there anyway. It starts off where from where I left off in chapter three. I really should have put it in the immediate last chapter, looking back on it, but, as dumb as this sounds…I was too lazy to put it down and also I forgot.**

**Side Story**

_Flashback_

Ai could not disobey its master, though it still futilely objected to the second part of its master's plan.

"_Boss…this is a bad idea."_

Naruto blinked once, mildly interested that Ai, for the first time, was commenting negatively on one of his ideas. He pinched off the fire, water, lightning and earth holographic projections of his gloves and boots and threw those parts away, where Ai stashed them into a compressed folder, most likely never to be seen again, asking. "Why do you think so?"

"_I believe that it would be detrimental to your health if you continually tax your body as you look for these 'perfect kidnappers'"_ Ai said with wavering sureness, the computers metallic voice cleared its non-existent throat, surprisingly, and went on. _"Would it not be better if you allowed them to take you to Sound and stayed there as a ninja? You would have the protection of a Sannin and his subordinates_ and _Hidden Sound is still a village that cannot be precisely pointed out on a map, your location would be secure."_

The red eyed boy sighed and rubbed his eyes. "Besides the fact that Orochimaru is abundant with enemies, of which Konoha is the foremost, and the bigger fact that if Konoha ninjas find out that I'm no longer in the village, which wont take long if my mother continues hiring outside trackers, they would find Sound. There is one massive reason I want to stay as far away from that…creep as possible."

"_Why, sir?"_

Naruto answered Ai's question with a question. "Why was Orochimaru expelled from the ninja force and branded as a missing ninja?"

The sophisticated computer could see the point its master was driving to a mile away but it could not leave a question Naruto had thrown to it unanswered without doing a thorough check of its memory bank. _"…He was caught…"_ Ai regretted not checking itself to get its facts straight. Naruto heard the hesitation but waited for the computer to reply as he threw away bits and pieces of wiring in the holographic projection that would make the gloves clunky. _"Purchasing…underage children from a wanted slave trader within Fire country borders. He has been doing this for years…since his chunin days."_

Ai had gotten this information from the lab Naruto had discovered years ago, the one he stumbled upon when he was finding a secret route out of the village. There weren't that many but there were cages and hidden rooms that were littered with specifically what looked like children's footprints and scrawled names on the weathered rocky walls of their prisons, written with their nails. The boy could only guess that it was the only way for the prisoners to keep their hopes up; that if they wrote their names then when people came to save them, then they wouldn't bother asking their names and just read it off the walls. Naruto had also found littered skeletons on the ground, years into decay, and that made the room reek of decomposing human bodies, human waste and death. The sigh and the stench were so bad that the inventor had to leave the building to throw up, not returning for a few days and on coming back he had Ai quickly scan the interior of the prison as he held his breathe and ran out again before he could inhale the foul odour. Most of the skeletons were organized properly, like they were untouched, and he could see slash marks on the necks, stabs through the skull and, in three cases, severed spines.

So the summary was that Orochimaru couldn't take them with him and he didn't want them with Konoha so he killed them. The warehouse was a known monument that was strictly forbidden from anyone, even shinobi with ANBU level clearance, and this meant that the authorities at the time of the bust, the Sandaime and most of the council, knew of the inhumane pens children were kept in, killed in, and they didn't respectfully bury their remains.

The building was kept up as a reminder of the depths humanity could reach in their selfishness. It was highly guarded and yet Naruto had found his way in and out on three occasions.

Naruto rubbed his nose with the back of his right hand and turned to his gloves so he could work, unsatisfied with where Ai had stopped her report.

"Keep going."

"…_He also took children from villagers."_ This information was gathered from what he had overheard during his one year as a street rat.

Naruto hummed. "Mhm and what did he do to the children he 'took' and 'purchased'?" the inventor urged.

"_He experimented on them-"_

"And?" the boy interrupted, stopping his work altogether and clenching his hand, he slowly placed his tight fists on the desk and narrowed his eyes at his gloves. Ai could sense the boy's discomfort.

"_Sir-"_

"No, tell me. What did Orochimaru do to those kids?" Naruto ordered in a low, tense voice. The man had been particularly proud of what he did and often wrote detailed reports of his profane acts in a partly decayed journal. The boy couldn't get passed the first few paragraphs before he set the book ablaze. But Ai had gotten an eyeful of what was on that page and thirteen more pages as the boy threw the book into the inferno.

"…_He repeatedly forced himself on them."_

The boy wasn't satisfied. Ai didn't want to say it but the boy pressed on. "He did what?"

"_He…raped them, sir."_

"Yeah, that's right." Naruto breathed out with a deep frown, his forced his hands open and flexed them, regaining control of his body again. The body crippling panic attack he usually experienced didn't come; he wasn't angry, he was sick. The nonsense the Sandaime spat out about the Will of Fire made him sick and the boy couldn't look the village leader in the eye after he found out the man left the warehouse untouched and standing tall as a symbol that Konoha wasn't the beacon of light people often thought it was. Kushina noticed the boys averted eyes every time and stopped bringing Naruto to the Sarutobi residence a week after Naruto stopped showing real respect for the old village leader. "And you want me to stay in the same general vicinity as a powerful pedophile _and_ serial rapist that runs a village called _Hidden Sound_?"

"…_My apologies, sir."_ It said quietly, respectfully.

Naruto rolled his neck and got to work on his gloves. "We're going with my plan."

**Authors note**

**That's that about that.**

**Leave a review on your thoughts, would you so graciously, stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	6. Chapter 6

**Allo!**

**Shout out to anthonym3, PinkiePieParty122894, lord 7th, Spark681, s.k.f.f.f, TipsyKitsune, TheKing91 and zerkeses. You guys are amazing :)**

**I've had this chapter in my computer for a month now. Haven't been able to publish for a while now cuz of school but now I have a few weeks off for end of the semester holiday.**

**Warning before you guys start reading; this chapter contains more in-depth knowledge on Kushina's relationship with a key Kunoichi of Konoha (and maybe a few more ninjas, male and female alike). I won't specify what or who. If you're interested, read and find out.**

CHAPTER 6

"Roku Hashitoro. A rank missing ninja of Kusa." A six foot tall man with light blue hair said, slamming the missing ninjas face into the counter of the Bounty Station on the outskirts of Waterfall country. The bounty hunter squeezed his neck threateningly when he felt the captured ninja preparing to bolt, promising a swift death if he tried anything stupid; Roku didn't need to be _alive_ for him to collect his bounty anyway. The man had his hands tied behind him, his mouth crudely taped shut with duct tape, his ankles tied together and he sported worrying purple gashes all over his exposed torso and neck. His shirt had been torn off in the mad fray of his capture and the bottom edges of his pants were slashed off at his knees, fraying like he had just barely escaped dying in a blender.

Those sitting on tables in the Bounty Station winced at the thought of what the infamously merciless bounty hunter had done to his new capture. They murmured conversations around as the tall man patiently stared at the receptionist as she counted out five hundred thousand ryu from five hundred bundles of one thousand notes, of which the masked hunter hummed, watching the shaking woman go over the notes she had counted out, neatly arranged them into a stack and waved for two Waterfall shinobi to take Roku away.

The bounty hunter that retrieved the elusive and incredibly evasive Roku of the Poison Mushroom stared at the money on the counter through his smooth, black rectangular goggles and the black tinted visor briefly blinked red, returning back to normal faster than the receptionist could see. The black half face mask he sported added to his cold mysterious persona and the grinning teeth drawn on the mask further instilled fear in the hearts of both the woman and the ninjas settled around in the station, with the mask moulding under the black goggles, showing it was separate from the visors and also the same, somehow. He was wearing a long, featureless black cloak that just reached his ankles, showing he did not opt for the usual shinobi sandals but rather he had on dark red with black soled boots. They clearly looked heavy, even without lifting them up, but for some reason the bounty hunter always managed to sneak up on his targets.

Thirty seconds passed of him simply staring at the money before the front of his cloak opened, showing the receptionist nothing as there was only blackness under, and a pair of dark red with black palmed gloves reached out with a scroll and sealed away the money, stashing it into his cloak and turning around smoothly. His cloak flapped in a flurry of non-existent wind as he exited he bounty station.

It was still early in the afternoon and all wondered whether he was heading back out to catch another high ranking and very dangerous missing ninja.

Roku was his third A rank that week.

He nudged open the door with his right hand and left the building. Out of sight and deep in the forest leading up to his current hideout, his body shimmered. He became significantly shorter, younger and the cloak shrank with him so as not to drag on the ground. He slid behind a tree and heaved out a sigh, pushing his goggles up to his forehead and clicking off his half mask so that it hung from his neck. He rubbed his tired eyes.

"_Well done, boss. You now have enough to finish the satellite."_

"Great." Naruto groused almost sarcastically, making Ai curious. "I'm being followed…aren't I?"

"_Yes, stalker has been identified as Tsume Inuzuka and her ninken, Kuromaru."_

This was Naruto's twentieth consecutively successful capture; he was bound to attract attention.

"_Do you wish to engage her, sir?"_

"Yeah, it's best if I take her out before she becomes a recurring problem." He leaped into the treeline and moved away from the woman, also in the opposite direction of his hideout. Predictably, Tsume followed suit with her dog companion shooting in a wide semicircle to cut Naruto off. "Pack up my stuff and take it to…" he hummed and clicked his half mask back on, fixing his goggles back over his eyes and looking at a list of places he saw as inherently safe to hide for the meantime. "Oni-Yuko town, Demon country."

"_Right away, sir."_ Ai replied and all the way back at Naruto's hideout, a clear fifty miles away from his current position, light blinked on in an abandoned underground bunker and one could see the wild assortment of technology had personally created hanging from the walls, set on his work table or parts littered on the ground. Naruto's duffle bag unfolded itself and slithered out from a dark corner of the room where his clothes were kept. There was a sharp click from that same corner of the room and a pair of blue eyes opened from the floor, rising off the ground up four foot and levitating out, buzzing with energy. It was a one by one foot red cube shaped robot that hovered off the ground with visible pulses of air and sound. Two thin pieces of metal came out from the sides and the very tip opened in three places, three finger-like additions to the robot, which it immediately used to fold Naruto's clothes into the bag. Another robot rose up from the work table and began cleaning the room of evidence while the boy's inventions whizzed and crumpled in on themselves, compacting into small sizes and shooting into a backpack. The lights eased out of the ceiling, taking with them an array of long wires out connected to the bottom of the bulbs and entered the technologically advanced backpack. Total darkness. Among the few things that couldn't fit into Naruto's tech backpack were dozens of heavy looking, rectangular boxes of varying sizes and colours, all of which hummed and gathered together in the middle of the pitch black room as if they were magnetically attracted to one another. Though, before they reached themselves they crumpled up and folded into half their size, buzzing and meeting the other similar boxes, piling up until they were about ten feet tall and seven feet wide. Back with Naruto, hot wind lifted him over Tsume's partner and he could clearly see the amazement in the wise dog's eye. _"You have three more tails, boss."_

Ai's unhurried voice echoed in his ears and he saw three added blue blips on the map of his general vicinity, along with the yellow blips that marked Tsume and Kuromaru. "This…oddly reminds of when we left Konoha, huh, Ai."

"…_Yes, sir, it does."_

"I'll use this chance to test my drones." Naruto said with a small undertone of an excited child itching to play with his new toys, and in a sense it was true. He studied what his super computer had gathered from the three further away pursuers; their chakra reserves, affinities, level of control and a vague assumption of who they were as compared to the bingo book Naruto had his computer analyse two months ago. He had three S ranks after him and an A rank tokubetsu jounin; it was good a time as any to pull out the best in his arsenal. "Deploy _Combat Drones: Alpha Lightning and Delta Water_."

"_Are you certain they would be enough, sir? I can also deploy _Suicide Drone: Alpha Bomb_ to finish them off quickly."_

Naruto shook his head and skimmed his eyes over the map for any free place he could openly fight with his Inuzuka pursuers and finally settled on a massive lake at the bottom of a waterfall. "Alpha Lightning and Delta Water are prototypes. I want to know if they are up to the task of repelling S rank threats or if they need tweaking."

"_Alright, sir."_

During Naruto's two months hiding from the whole world, it wasn't only his gloves and he had been working on; he had created a series of drones labelled according to their danger level and the strength of their attacks. They were Combat and Suicide Drones and each of the two branches of Naruto's drones were split up into four distinct robots based on their power level and their sophistication; Alpha, Beta, Gamma and Delta.

Naruto had sixteen drones evenly split between combat and suicide and all where yet to be tested out on worthy opponents. They could be remotely controlled by Ai or Naruto at any time, as none had a consciousness of their own by Naruto's choice.

"If they are not up to the task then force a retreat. Lead the three S ranks to me."

Ai was not against her master's plan, not completely, but its own concern was Naruto overexerting himself. He had just come back from a two day tracking mission finding Roku of the Poison Mushroom and now he was forced to evade capture from not one but four individuals and one capable dog. His focus was hand-to-hand during those tracking missions and now it was Naruto's chance to test his inventions.

Naruto skipped onto the water, hovering with a low hum just over the surface and not using any chakra at all. He slid far away as Kuromaru dive bombed him from above, crashing onto the water and creating a deadly shockwave. Naruto ground his teeth and lowered his centre of gravity, steadying himself over the water he wasn't even touching and narrowed his eyes at the ninken, who prowled around him with his one eye studying the genius. Naruto's goggles saw through the dog's skin, cutting into his bone and finding the dog was nursing a limp from a previous injury to his right hind leg. A potential weakness Naruto was willing to exploit.

The now blue haired boy stood up straight and cast off his black cloak, sealing it into the back of his gloves. He was wearing a short sleeved black shirt with black shorts, his black with red palmed and soled gloves and boots only served to add to the reputation the boy had been building as a bounty hunter. His red gloves stopped three inches from his wrists and segmented silver metal started coming out from the gloves and crept up to Naruto's elbows, covering his elbows right before Kuromaru's eyes. Tsume witnessed as silver plates of metal rose up from Naruto's boots and covered up to a bit under his knees. He was noticeably without the katana blade Tsume had heard the masked bounty hunter commonly used.

Ai's metallic voice spoke to Naruto as this process finished. _"Armed and ready, boss."_

Naruto didn't provide any reply as he watched the reaction on his aunt's face at his transformation. Gone was the wide eyed, eager to impress boy she saw grow and now she was staring at the cold, heartless child that had built a Fortress of Technology around himself, fleeing from his life in Konoha to kami knows where.

Naruto's eyes flicked up and a visual of both combat drones played on the top left corner of his goggles, proving that it was indeed Sasori of the Red Sands, the Mad Bomber Deidera and the Bloody Uchiha, Itachi. The drones buzzed high in the air, far away from reach from two of the grounded shinobi, and fired off attacks. The Alpha Lightning whizzed around a rain of senbon from Sasori and crackled with blue lightning, shooting it at a puppet that clanked upwards through the air at it. The lightning blew open the puppet and followed down the thread to Sasori, who wisely cut the connection before he was killed by the Lightning Manipulation of Alpha Lightning. Delta water spun around Itachi as the prodigious Uchiha blew out columns of fire at the robot with the motivation of an uncaring stranger but the Water Manipulation using Delta Water dove under the fire and a stream of chakra-less water tore from the three small guns at the front, something that made Itachi bring his fire attacks down, slightly amazed that the small, featureless robot was holding its own against his fire.

Ai brought Naruto out of his distracted daze, fascinatedly watching his drones hold off two of the S ranks but sighing as Deidera left his comrades to their plight in order to go to his target. Very soon, Itachi and Sasori would switch drones and Naruto figured he would have to order a retreat.

The Inuzuka stared at the boy and scratched her red fang painted cheek. She jumped over the obvious question of what had forced this drastic change in her precious adopted nephew and why he had fled from home and said. "What's the plan now, kid?"

"I kill you and your ninken. Kill those S ranks and disappear again. That's the plan." the blue haired boy answered, hinting at the Inuzuka's preventable demise if she decided to look the other way and allow Naruto to flee. He assumed Kakashi had given his mother reasonable warning of what would happen if anyone else was to come after him and so far Orochimaru was steering clear of him, for the time being.

From what she had seen of Kakashi, Naruto wouldn't mind killing her or Kuromaru and that raised her heckles, the thought of the incoming S ranks temporarily left her. _'Oh I'm gonna beat the _shit_ out of you, pup…'_

Naruto settled into a fighting stance when he saw Tsume growl at him, her eyes wild and her teeth clenched together fiercely. Kuromaru followed his partners lead, copying her controlled rage and preparing to pounce at Naruto. Naruto's black palms glowed with white energy as he held his right hand facing down, chest level and his left was straight forward and also facing down. His knees were bent and were shoulder length apart, his right was slightly in front of the left and his head tilted down. The experienced Inuzuka recognized the fighting stance immediately and, strangely enough, she saw a mental image of Naruto's mother when she was thirteen years old in Naruto's place. It was the fighting style Kushina had fully mastered and used during their fight during in chunin exams, even used till that day.

The _Steam Scorpion Fighting style_.

Her mind didn't want to remember what the woman had done to her using the style during their match in River country but her body forced her to; a rupture kidney, four broken ribs, a fractured femur and a dislodged lung. She wasn't sure how she had survived that fight but it had cemented Tsume's place under Kushina. The red haired woman was the alpha, in Tsume's opinion. The dominant in whatever twisted relationship she had with the married woman. Just thinking about how Kushina could break her will and her resolve as a human being by being in Tsume's general area made her heart shudder with pleasure. She fought her desire down and brought her mind back on track when Kuromaru glared at her to focus. Her snarl settled back in place but Naruto already saw the waves of emotions pass over the woman's face.

He could _smell_ her desire.

Ai sent a small shock into his body once his eyes widened and his limbs froze in horror. The super computer muffled its master's voice with the technologically advanced half mask. "I-I-I need to get away from her."

He looked up sharply, snapping out of his fear, when someone screamed down at him from the sky.

"Die, Namikaze shit!"

The world moved slowly as a blurry swarm of clay birds squawked down at him from the bomber, who was standing on a large drill beaked bird. Naruto fixed his eye on one clay bird and Ai analysed it, breaking it down to its very base components.

Naruto raised his hands up, facing them at the swarm and the white light glowed brighter and brighter, until Naruto muttered. _"Chaos Wind Shock Wave."_

The best way to describe what happened next was by saying that gravity gave out and the whole world _groaned_.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The ground shook.

The air exploded.

An unseen force pressed down on them, the robots they were fighting included. Sasori's hands shook as he fought to keep himself from succumbing to the pressure and Itachi blinked numerous times and grit his teeth in concentration, visibly fighting the force from bringing him to his knees.

The robots they had been engaged with crashed into the ground and whined loudly, blaring out alarms that they were about to shut down. Then, almost abruptly, the pressure eased off them and the lightning and water using robots wobbled off the ground weakly, sparking and squealing, shakily rising high into the air much too quickly for the two recovered S ranks to destroy them. They only saw the flying contraptions shooting south west of them, disappearing not too long later. Their lack of chakra was clearly annoying both of the feared shinobi and they tore towards the source of the earth shattering shock wave.

"What the hell was that?" Sasori asked, confused and still getting over the feeling of being pressed down by seemingly nothing.

After his question was voiced, they could both think of who could possibly, according to the reports, produce such a devastating attack.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Naruto's eyebrows visibly creased over his goggles as he stared at the product of the catastrophe.

"Maybe I used too much power."

Clumps of clay fell from the sky like rain and so did drops of water from what used to be the lake, and what was now a wide crater in the ground with a dripping source of water that used to be called a waterfall. No doubt the waterfall would recover and refill the lake but it would take some time for that to happen. Tsume groaned from the ground, where she had been standing when Naruto had thrown the wide scale attack, and her chest throbbed. Maybe she could add this injury to the list of injuries caused by the two Uzumaki. She whimpered when she couldn't feel her limbs or her chakra, not even thinking twice to know that it was Naruto that had brought this upon her and her partner. Two months in and he was still getting used to the increased power output of his gloves and boots, as opposed to the combat inventions he created back in Konoha, because these newer inventions were mostly solar powered, having chakra as their secondary source of power, and it was not only lighter to carry than his older model but also sleeker. Compared to the older model, it was like Naruto was carrying nothing and as such he would overestimate how much power he needed to push out.

Naruto flexed his right hand and tightened his hold on Diedara's hair, raising the older blonde up a bit and taking off his half mask.

"You're wearing the same kind of cloak Kisame had when I killed him." the boy mused audibly, sweeping his black tinted goggle protected eyes over the weak form of the mad bomber. Naruto caught the man as he fell from the sky and summarily shut down his connection to his chakra with a well-placed, wide spread _Chakra Destabilizer_. There was a fair bit the genius could do with his supply of tech as long as he over planned how he would accomplish it, like the Wind Shock Wave that had possibly broken all of Kuromaru's bones, was a combination of wind and a wave of sound so low that it couldn't be perceived by anyone that wasn't attuned to detecting earthquakes. It had gone as far as a three miles from his location and had broken his two drones, forcing them to flee early so they could be repaired by him later on. Ai was currently sifting through the video feed of it controlling the drones and noting down where they lacked and where needed adjustments, so Naruto pushed the drones from his mind before he could start conjuring alterations to his inventions, focusing on the limp Iwa missing ninja in his hand. "Some sort of organization that is under the radar." He mumbled. "Underworld? Probably-"

"What the fuck…?" Diedara growled in a raspy voice, unbelievably weak and in pain at being held up by his blonde hair. "Are you talking about?"

"Who do you work for?" Naruto asked once, contemplating whether or not to classify the red cloud wearing organization as a threat and if he should take action by eradicating them before they could find a way around his tech and get him. "I'm not gonna ask you again, Diedara." Then it clicked in Naruto's mind and he sighed, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Why am I asking you? Ai."

He called and the computer promptly answered. _"Yes, boss?"_

Naruto used his other hand to grab Diedara by his jaw, covering his mouth and stopping the grumbling stream of profanity coming from his mouth. The boy looked at the Iwa missing ninja's blonde hair and his glasses scanned them, and even without the scan he could notice something familiar. "Are those water droplets in his hair?"

"_Yes, sir, they are. Water mixed with chakra."_

"Water mixed with chakra?" the boy asked, more to himself than anything. Aside from the water drops falling from above, caused from his shock wave attack, he could see a distinct difference with his glasses. A presence of chakra in the water. "Affinity?"

"_A perfect mix of all five, sir."_

Naruto pursed his lips in thought. "The chakra is weaved in equal measure to each drop of water, so chakra rain that is not harmful." He then scratched his chin and his eyes lowered to think long and hard. "Chakra rain, chakra rain, chakra rain…chakra rain…" he posed his next question to his faithful computer. "Show me the map of the continent and highlight places of high water level and constant rain, _not_ constant mist." River, Waterfall, Marsh, Uzushio and Ameagakure glowed blue.

"_Ameagakure is the only place on the continent that rains all day and all night, sir."_

"That's right, and River and Marsh countries are popularly neutral. Waterfall have no reputable gangs, not to talk of underworld organizations with S rank missing ninjas," that last point he knew all too well for one of his capture missions was clipping off the head of the leader of an infamous gang and submitting the leaders head as proof of the kill. Besides the A rank the leader, the members were largely B and C rank. They were scattered when their leader died and it was relatively easy picking them off one by one. "Uzushio too is barren of any life since the Uzumaki were wiped out."

Ai noticed he referred to the famed and almost extinct clan as if he was not among. Rather, Naruto was an honorary member by birth for being the son of the Princess of the Whirlpool, the Red Hot Blooded Habanero, Kushina Uzumaki. If anything, his name should have been Naruto Namikaze or Uchiha but Kushina had imposed her will on her husband and gave her child her clan name out of the great love she had for him in her heart. Her master might as well not have any surname.

"No one has been in Ame since the Second Great Ninja war, so that makes it all the more possible they've recruited S ranked missing ninjas to some sort of secret organization."

Zetsu was impressed at how quickly Naruto had figured out not only the existence of the Akatsuki but also the location of their main base. He wondered if he should step in and convince Naruto to align his loyalty with him instead of with Pein…

"Will they be a threat or not…? That's what I'm wondering…" he removed his left hand from his chin and placed his pointer and thumb on Deidera's windpipe. The man's eyes widened with terror when he realized what the boy intended to do to him. Naruto shrugged, not having a care in the world. "Either way, I don't see why I should keep you alive."

Naruto was about to rip Diedara's windpipe from his neck, a prospective death so agonizing that Diedara began screaming in earnest, trembling with all his might so that Naruto would release him and he could flee from this blue haired monster. The boy's fingers tightened on the blondes neck and gradually dug in, closing off all air from the bombers lungs. Diedara's face started turning an unpleasant shade of purple, then blue and then a pale grey as Naruto got a good grip on the man's windpipe.

His wrist flicked but he stopped when he heard his name from across the crater.

"Naruto, wait!"

He hovered up as water slowly filled the crater from the drops falling from the heavens and Diedara choked when Naruto used his grasped windpipe to hold him up. Naruto was clearly not concerned with the dying blonde he held with his left thumb and pointer finger. His goggles cut through the small rain and his eyes met Itachi's.

The three tomoe sharingan spun lazily and Naruto hummed, displeased.

"_Genjutsu successful repelled, boss."_

Naruto tilted his head to the side and Itachi saw that his hypnotic eyes had not worked. His was overcome with shock that his sharingan had, for the first time in his life, failed him. He tried again.

"_Genjutsu successfully repelled."_ Ai repeated as it once again deflected an illusion from its master, aided by Naruto's 'eternally activated sharingan' eyes. _"Genjutsu successfully repelled."_

"You know, this is a horrible first impression, Itachi." Naruto called from the middle of the gradually filling crater. He knew of his aunt Mikoto's oldest son but never really spoke to him, or saw him for that matter. There was only that brat Sasuke, who was three years younger than him and Naruto chose not to associate much with the daddy-pleasing boy.

He had read that Itachi had snapped and killed half of his clan mates before his mother and her best friend, Kushina, who had been staying in the Kurama clan compound with Naruto, had the oldest Uchiha flee from them. Naruto was nine when that happened and despite that he couldn't use the confusion to sneak away, not until a month later when Kushina was out on a mission.

The feats of wonders Itachi had performed were something of an interest to Naruto, a small interest, because the older Uchiha was known to not resort to violence in most situations, unless it could be avoided. It was why Itachi used illusions instead of specializing in another field, like kenjutsu.

Naruto saw small blue dots gather on the edges of the crater and he noticed small wisps of chakra coming from Sasori. He promptly said. "Let's not do that, Sasori. I have your…friend? Yeah, friend, here and he'll be missing a windpipe if either of you make any sudden moves." Diedara's body tensed and his mouth gaped like a fish out of water as Naruto emphasized his point by holding on harder to the immobilized bombers throat. It was best to address this situation now and avert any problem in the future, so he skipped over asking the morbidly surprised Uchiha and spoke to the cool, pleasantly smiling puppet man. "What do you guys want with me?"

Diedara was getting greyer and greyer, entering the throes of death, suffocating as Naruto's fingers made it increasingly harder for him to breathe. His chest shook and he inhaled and exhaled shallow breathes, completely paralyzed and at the mercy of the Namikaze child he had underestimated from the very beginning. Tsume and Kuromaru, unable to move due to the inventor's destabilizers and forgotten by the blue haired genius, laid at the bottom of the slowly filling lake. Kuromaru was unconscious, unable to take the pain of having a majority of his bones broken, while Tsume was making futile attempts at moving towards her partner. She couldn't scream, as the water had risen above her head and the weight holding her arms down, as well as her lack of contact with her chakra, made her roar in desperation.

This boy, Kushina's son, had brought not only her down but an S ranked mad man with only one attack.

If she survived, then she was going to submit her mind, body and soul to the two Uzumaki. It took more than anything to bring her down; the suitors _her_ mother had showed her when she was a child and those brave enough to flirt with her knew this deadly, daring fact very well. She had dismantled more than her fair share of people in the recent week and she intended to do so for the rest of her life until someone even slightly close to Kushina's power level was found.

Oddly enough, her current predicament reminded her of what Kushina had done to her to force it into her head that failure to capture her son was not an option. Tsume's head had been forced into a bathtub of water and held there, while the submissive woman flailed wildly, bubbling out for mercy. That act had turned her on more than anything in her life and being submerged in water and completely forgotten by her target, her adopted nephew, spiked pleasure throughout her body. Her mind was a haze as she struggled not to let water flood her nose and mouth, gurgling for her new master's attention. Her depraved sense of pleasure overloaded her brain alongside the desperation to breathe and, twitching and convulsing under the water with the hope of saving her partners life somewhere, _somewhere_, at the back of her mind, her body locked up, her mouth flew open and she _climaxed_.

The thundering force of her release was enough to knock her out.

Naruto had completely forgotten about his drowning aunt and Ai made a small note for him to do something about her before its master left the area. For the meantime, he listened to what Sasori had to saw as Diedara's life drained from his body.

After the legendary puppet master had finished promoting the Akatsuki to him, with some input by the still dumbfounded Uchiha, to the satisfaction of Zetsu, who Naruto had long since detected and kept a secure lock on all this time, Naruto opened his mouth and gave his answer.

**Authors note**

**This isn't turning into a lemon story. Don't get your hopes up :P**

**Updates will now be every two days. Hopefully.**

**Let me know what you think of this chapter, would you so kindly. Stay safe wherever you are in the world and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	7. Chapter 7

**Ello!**

**Shout out to anthonym3, PinkiePieParty122894, TheForgottenSuns75, lord 7th, Dawood Saqlain, TheKing91 and Inzaneamaru. You're all wonderful :)**

**A few of you might be disappointed…hehehe XD**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 7

"No."

Naruto's words echoed a minute after Sasori had finished explaining why the three S ranks were there and why Naruto should joint their cause. Naruto tilted his head to the side and his lips dipped down as his mind worked.

"I'm not interested in joining the Akatsuki."

Itachi couldn't say he wasn't surprised by the child's answer but he still found his eyes bulging. He pursed his lips, still shocked that his sharingan illusions were deflected not too long ago, and said. "Naruto…think about this for a minute-"

"I already have." Naruto said, releasing Diedara and not watching as the half dead mad bomber splashed into the shallow water he was hovering above. He looked to be dead anyway; unresponsive, unmoving, not breathing, as pale as the moon. "Your interests don't align with mine at all. You want to gather bounties for some mysterious reason I'm not allowed to know unless I actually join this 'exclusive' club of yours. I'm not interested in fighting forever, especially not for a cause I don't know. I _politely_ decline your invitation."

There was silence for five long minutes, almost as if time was frozen.

A boy several years their junior had declined to join the gang of S ranks. It would have been better if Naruto said he wanted some time to think about their exclusive offer.

Sasori's wooden body clicked before he even moved.

Blazing blue chakra strings exploded from the tips of his Hiruko puppet armour as well as the hunched spine of the terror inducing puppet. The strings grabbed the drowning mad bomber and the two Konoha ninjas from under, adding as well at least ten more, white clothed puppets of varying types and designs, all armed with an array of weapons.

Naruto clicked his half mask back in place and shot backwards as Itachi spat out a ball of molten fire from his mouth. He skipped onto the water, the constantly humming white energy keeping him about half an inch from the surface of the water, and he hastily raised his shin to block a roundhouse kick from Itachi as the S ranked Uchiha appeared from out of nowhere before him, the silver plating from his boots to under his knees clinking on contact.

The genius Uzumakis eyes narrowed and his right fist was slapped aside when four of his fingers made to tear into Itachi's throat, forcing him to roll to the side with the motion else Itachi rip off his goggles and try his hand again at the illusion. The boy right himself again and pointed his left palm at his opponent, ablaze with white energy ever ready to decimate whatever was before it, but withdrew his hand back as quickly as possible as two _Fang over Fang_ attacks almost ripped his arm out of its socket.

"_Water Manipulation: Inverted Senbon Hailstorm."_ Naruto growled and slammed his palms down onto the rising body of water below him.

THUD!

BTOOOOOOM!

A shockwave resonated through the water, ripples carrying from his position in the middle of the lake to the very edges, where Sasori was controlling Tsume, Kuromaru, Diedara and his puppets to rain down on the boy. A bone shaking sound too low and too fast to be noticed by any normal person whistled through the water.

Tsume and Kuromaru dove at him again for another attempted _Fang over Fang_ to rend the thirteen year old boy to pieces, they were clearly not in control of their bodies and their minds were vacant as they were long since unconscious from drowning. Water dribbled out of their mouths in large spurts and blood seeped from their noses in trickling lines. Diedara was conscious though unable to muster the strength to move his body himself; he skipped over the water, under Sasori's control and bolted to his targets position. The white clothed puppets did so as well, clattering and whistling with murderous intent. Itachi chose to keep his distance in case the boy used his chakra cancelling attack, staying at the edge of the lake and skimming around with focused eyes, his sharingan straining and spinning wildly in his orbs to see what the boy wanted to do.

Spikes poked out from the surface of the water.

Itachi turned to Sasori and was about to yell for him to pull back.

It was too late.

Dark blue water senbon shot upwards from the lake and impaled anything that moved and breathed on its surface.

It was like looking at the world's first inverted hailstorm, except the solid attacks were made from three inch long, hard water that had lethal pointed tips.

It was something straight out of a science fiction novel; there was no set of hand seals or jutsu that could conjure such a devastating attack, only if the person had soaked the water with his chakra previously and used it as an extension of his body, and yet it would still take too long to do and would take a toll on the user.

The needles rising upwards in a blinding hail of rain lodged themselves deep in the puppets and it was only when Sasori released Tsume and Kuromaru was he able to activate safety seals, half a second and hundreds of senbon stabs later, to deflect the needles. The force of the rising senbon stabbed, slashed and shredded the Konoha ninja and her ninken and carried them upwards into the sky, disposing them hundreds of feet away from the lake and into the surrounding forest.

Needles perforated every single part of their bodies and it was just enough to force them out of their water induced unconscious state.

Her chakra was back but her body was stuffed like a pincushion, preventing her limbs and joints from moving and driving a horrible sort of pain into her body. Knowing that it was Naruto that had caused this pain her eyes threatened to roll into the back of her head with soul damning pleasure but she barely activated the tracking seal on her back by focusing chakra to the small of her back before she blacked out once again. The T&I department would see her tracker was on and, suspecting she needed reinforcements, would come and get her.

Diedara was in a similar state, except there were about twenty long needles cutting through his eyes and into his brain.

He hung limply from a tree branch.

Dead.

Itachi grabbed Sasori before the puppet master could lose his mind and pulled him back, abandoning the white clothed, needle perforated puppets to their fate as Naruto shot straight up dozens of miles above the waterfall. The rising needles never once touching him as he flew into the sky, over the dense forest. His goggles kept track of the fleeing S ranks as they weaved through the trees of the near forest. His hands flatted against each other and he held it up to his chest; another sound, this time short and violent, rocked through the air.

The water senbon froze.

The silence was stifling, only interrupted by the pattering of the retreating ninjas' feet on the lush grassy ground.

Naruto's eyes cut through the haze of water senbon, all still pointed upwards, and locked onto the small, though vital, cluster of nerves on the back of Itachi's neck and tried to do the same with Sasori but the closest to the important bundle of life supporting nerves was a single, blaringly bright, but super suppressed, source of chakra inside the Hiruko shell. The boy activated the X-ray vision of his goggles without so much as uttering a word and saw the real Sasori working frantically to run, spawning strings from his fingers, which originated from the cylinder.

"Ai."

"_Targets locked, sir."_

The unheard buzz of sound from Naruto's gloves and boots amplified so that it sounded like an eerie whistle. The genius separated his palms and he pointed it at the two ninjas. Naruto calculated their distance, taking into account the extra layer of armour for Sasori, and applied the needed amount of energy to painfully send them to the afterlife.

If Sasori and Itachi could have heard Naruto through his voice muffling half mask then they would have applied even more chakra to their legs to run.

"_Fire."_

_Zip zip zip zip~_

Millions of senbon, none of which had a single drop of chakra, zipped towards their target from Naruto, bending around trees and shrubs and keeping above the ground.

Itachi's sharingan morphed and he disappeared in a flurry of crow feathers but in his haste he forgot his sole surviving partner, who did not have any kind of teleportation ability.

The senbon initially spread out and carved out the back of the Hiruko puppet, creating a gaping hole from where there used to be a solid iron tail and hunched spine, exposing the puppet master. This happened within thirty seconds, so Sasori's absolute surprise at his armour puppet being torn open was justified. He wasn't allowed any more time for surprises as the water, after another pulse of sound from far behind him, converged a bit closer and drove into his heart seal from behind, not allowing him the chance to turn around and provide any sort of defence.

The old puppet master gasped and in his distraction, his right side slammed into a tall, thick tree, destroying what was left of his already shredded Hiruko puppet armour, sending him out and crashing through two smaller but no less strong trees.

A spasm rocked his body and, then, he realized that his lower half had also been torn to wooden pieces by the rain of senbon, which had stopped after he had hit those trees. His fingers twitched and his mouth creaked open and shut, futilely trying to summon his chakra to defend himself as he heard a pair of feet land close to his body with a chilling _thunk!_

Naruto looked down at the once proud Suna missing ninja as the throes of death overtook him; his eyes frantically blinked, his mouth creaked and groaned, sounding like a small dying animal and Naruto could see the chakra pulse out of the perforated _Heart seal_ with his computer goggles, enhanced by his red 'eternally activated sharingan' eyes. The Akatsuki robe the ninja had been wearing was in tatters, showing him to be in a simple sleeveless black shirt and what used to be brown ninja pants. The boy stomped to the dying ninja and scanned his body briefly.

He gave a light smile when he saw small storage seals on the puppet man's body, no doubt holding his infamous puppets.

'_Lord Leader will kill you, brat!'_ Sasori wanted to roar but his jaw was unresponsive, probably due to a few needles lodged in the back of his head.

"Two dead S ranks." Naruto commented and stared down at the dying ninja. He had previously ordered Ai to 'un-muffle' his half mask so Sasori would hear him. "One of which could have been prevented if you left me alone." He stood over the disgraced ninja and placed his right foot on the _Heart seal_, slowly pressing down and making the wooden man's eyes enlarge with realization. The holes burrowed by the previous water needles had done their job of incapacitating him and now the boy was here to personally finish the job. Naruto tilted his head to the side and unhooked his half mask, showing his slight frown. "Let's make it _three_ S rank deaths."

_Crunch!_

Sasori of the Red Sands eyes dimmed.

Zetsu dared not approach as Naruto turned to his position. 

Pein was _not_ going to be happy.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Two days later_

_Somewhere in Demon country_

Thunder rumbled through the sky and blazing blue bolts of lightning crackled down from the heavens, smashing into the ground and scorching the rain soaked earth.

Any living creature that made the mistake of being outside during this storm was almost assured to be struck by lightning.

For some people, seeing lightning shooting down from the sky was a death wish but for Naruto, he saw it as an alternative power supply for when the sun was not present. And even if the sun was present, he would have preferred the sheer, direct electrical energy in lightning than the rigorously processed form that could be gotten from the sun.

The wind screamed in the boys ears and the heavy downpour matted down his newly dyed grey hair to his head, making some of the dye wash off so that patches of his naturally sunny blonde hair showed through the grey. The genius stomped forward steadily, his tech boots fastening firmly to the ground with a combination of hardening the muddy ground with a quick blast of heat and a strong suction. In his tech gloved covered right hand was a ten foot long metal rod that was about two inches in diameter while his left covered the top of his goggled eyes, shading his vision from the blinding rain. He trusted the map his computer companion was showing him to not lead him off the cliff he was on. The dark green and white rain poncho he was wearing flapped dangerously on his body, looking as if at any moment it would rip off his torso and fly off to wherever the wind took it. He made sure to hold the metal rod away from his body and facing upwards to the sky, his gloved hands tightly gripped on the piece of metal with all his human and technologically amplified might.

Naruto grit his teeth and hissed as a particularly strong wave of wind and rain smashed into him from in front, making sure to keep walking on with his slow, careful pace. His booted feet made muffled thumps on the ground with each stomp and Naruto's hidden red eyes looked around with as much calmness he could muster and asked, his voice completely silent from outside his half mask.

"Is this far enough?!" he winced when an arc of lightning crackled down and struck the metal pole. The bolt passed through the rod, deflected away from the insulated gloves and entered the ground in the blink of an eye. Naruto was thankful for his gloves more than he had ever been before, for that was the ninth bolt of lightning to hit the rod.

Ai spoke loudly back, though making sure not to damage its master's ears. _"Yes, sir!"_

Naruto grabbed the rod with both hands and raised it over his head, bringing the end down and sinking it down in to the earth. He held it with both hands and pushed it further down into the soft, wet ground and stood back before another bolt crashed into the metal rod. Naruto used his right hand to hold the front of his rain poncho and squinted his eyes up to the tip of the lightning conductor. "Open it up!"

The very tip hissed and a white line crawled down five inches from the tip, dividing the top into four and it snapped open abruptly to form four open points. Naruto inched forward a little and tapped the rod once and a glowing red panel on the back of his right glove opened up, like a hologram but much more advanced than the ones he used before. He swiped left and used his other pointer finger to turn a holographic dial. The sky rumbled dangerously and the boy squinted again with his eyes up on the divided tip of the lightning conductor. This time, white hot lightning flew down and smashed onto the tech rod but instead of flowing down into the ground like it was supposed to, it bounced off the open tip and shot through the rain to another conductor, which also had an open top and made the lightning, still as deadly as it had been coming down from the sky, bounce off the top and to a last conductor on the top of a small uprising with a human sized opening at the front, Naruto's current hideout.

Naruto could see his lights flicker, showing that it had worked.

The cave Naruto had made his temporary home stood close to the edge of a cliff. The top was covered in lush green grass, which was presently overcome with the rain, and could easily be confused with a real hill.

The genius had previously placed nine more conductors strategically around his hideout, one to actually take the force of the incoming bolt and another rod received the passed on bolt, which was immediately passed to the last one at the top of the uprising, passing the current into the base and through a complex network of wires.

Naruto stayed where he was, wincing slightly with each crack of lightning that narrowly missed him but diverted to his conductor, and he swiped at the bright red hologram console floating over the back of his glove and moved away the dial. His goggles showed the nine other dials at full blast, so he cycled through a few options on the glove hologram until he reached one that controlled all the dials. His left pointer finger touched the hologram and slowly moved it down. "Turn on the lights!" Ai quickly did so and blaring white lights flashed on, Naruto continued turning the dial down and the lights dimmed with it until they were at their normal brightness, despite the electricity passing through them. He shook his hand and the red hologram fizzled away. He roared over the rain, admiring the conductor before him. "Charge my satellite's battery!"

"_Alright, sir!"_

"How long until its full?!"

"_Five days, sir!"_

"It's better than before!" he replied, pleased with his lightning rod inventions. He began making his way back to his hideout.

Though the sun was a good and reliable source of power, it would take too long for it to fully charge the battery he intended to use for his satellite. That battery was a lot larger than the ones he used for his gloves, boots and even his goggles, as it was meant to serve Naruto in space for an indefinite number of years. He wanted it to be fully charged before he shot it into orbit, where it can slowly take in solar energy from the sun.

He was still a long way from finishing the satellite to his satisfaction, as he needed to buy more good quality parts to work with, but with the completion of the battery for his satellite, his prospective invention was already seventy percent finished. He relished in his achievement as he marched back to his base. A massive storm was rolling through Demon country from the ocean and would subside greatly once it reached Fire country, and Naruto's weather forecast promised it would last a week before the lightning would reduce drastically and the rain would subside. If he had relied on the sun, his plan would have taken much longer. The storm itself was unexpected but not unappreciated, as the boy smiled a bit widely under his mask, holding the front of his poncho and shading his goggled eyes.

Naruto's satellite, aptly called _The Hyper Sight_, was an invention that would finally allow Naruto to relax even more if it was successfully launched into space. It would keep an eye on the world for any possible danger moving to him, whether it was human or natural, warn him and he would be prepared for it. For it was possible a speedster like the Raikage of Kumo or faint presence like the one he had sensed two days ago when he was with Itachi, Sasori and Diedara, could shoot to him before his senses or Ai could even make him aware, not to even talk of him being ready to defend himself. It would also give him a more detailed map of the planet, identify everyone on the planet and reveal secrets no one else would have known. He didn't care much on spying on everyday people but there were those that he needed to keep a close eye on.

And anyway, it won't be him doing the watching, it would be Ai.

His senses and Ai's sensory field combined was still limited to five miles, at his current age, but the Hyper Sight would expand this to cover the whole world.

Some would think this was too much but Naruto would beg to differ.

Being paranoid had kept him alive and partly sane for years and it would do so for the rest of his life, which he hoped would be peaceful and quiet.

Naruto's ultimate plan after he had finished all his listed inventions was to move to a solitary island with his tech and spend the rest of his life in solitude.

That's really all he ever wanted.

Ai would keep him company, as the super computer was gradually growing more and more sentient, but he wanted to live away from anymore human contact.

Life for him, presently, was one struggle after another.

One trauma after another.

One _betrayal_ after another.

He was just…tired.

Learning how to fight was so as to ensure he wasn't harassed like he had been for the majority of his life and yet he still couldn't completely kick his fear of women. Technology was invented so that he didn't have to directly face his fears without being paralyzed, rendering him unable to move, unable to breathe and unable to think. His tech gave him some confidence, which had saved him from succumbing to hysteria a number of times.

That was another thing; his hysteria.

It didn't end with him freezing with in absolute fear in the presence of a powerful female and not only his mind becoming a jumbled mess, screaming for him to flee, or at least move his body away, but not able to respond at all.

No.

In Naruto's hysteria, his mind shattered and it was like his soul was trapped in his body, yearning for the sweet release of death but wrongly forced to endure the punishment of the eternal torment of living through his nightmares. Naruto's sanity deteriorated and crumbled to nothing with every passing day; day after day of silent, muted hysteria, exposed to the one person that could bring that dreaded side out of him.

His mother was the only person that made Naruto hysterical.

She didn't even need to be around for him to become paralyzed with fear and lose all sense of reason. It got worse with time until Naruto feared he would become a simple soulless husk if he didn't do something about it.

Ai shocked his system when it felt Naruto's muscles tense painfully, freeing him from the memories earlier in his life and onto the matter at hand.

The further away he was from her, the better.

He ducked through the entryway of his hideout and turned around to slam the recently installed metal door shut. He breathed raggedly as he ambled around so that he faced the wall next to the door, taking off his rain poncho and hanging it on a bent nail in the wall close to the door. He rubbed his gloved hands together and white energy hummed softly from the circular area on his black palms, drying the water from the gloves and warming his hands in the process. His boots followed suit and dried themselves, after which he moved deeper into the cave, through a short tunnel that sloped downwards, where a soft white light pulsed soothingly from the area at the end of the tunnel. His soaking wet shirt and pants irritated him a lot, and so when he entered the well-lit area he threw off his shirt and kicked off his pants, leaving him in only a pair of warm orange boxers. The cave was spacious enough to contain a freshly carved work table, devoid of parts or paper, three large, black rectangular boxes sitting at the far corner of the cave, his duffle bag and backpack, both empty, were neatly folded and placed in a drawer normal wooden desk near the three metal boxes. There was a makeshift wardrobe that housed all of his articles of clothing, at the bottom of which had his toolbox, his maintenance kit and his repair kit. The ground was smoothened out rocks that were frigidly cold if he were to walk on them barefooted. The cave was cold. He shivered and muttered.

"Heaters." A low buzz emanated from behind him to his left and right, at the sides of the immediate entrance to the cave. Two circular fans wedged high on the wall with more nails whirred gently and a metal grate gradually turned red with heat. The fan lightly blew this heat outwards into the cave and Naruto shivered again, plodding to his wardrobe for warm clothes while the heaters did their job. He took off his gloves and kept them on the work table, picking out a thick purple sweater and black shinobi pants, having to briefly take off his boots to put on the latter piece of clothing. He returned to his work table and put on his gloves. The plates of metal that usually wound up to his elbows and knees were noticeably not there as he had not activated their combat uses yet. Under the table were more metal boxes, most of which were a different colour or a different size but his attention was not on them but on the table. "Ai, dim the lights a bit." The computer answered and reduced the intensity of the light until Naruto said. "That's enough." Now the lights could still illuminate the room a little bit but it couldn't exactly be used to read. The blonde-grey haired boy hefted up a five by five foot mirror from under the work table, on top of the metal boxes, and placed it onto the table. He snapped his fingers and two hologram projectors a few metres apart and pointed down at an angle over the table popped on, shooting out soft blue light and creating a pillar of light that went rose up from the mirror.

Naruto immediately went to work on confirming the things he needed to get before his satellite could be finished, all of which could only be gotten in Kumo and Snow country, both of which were all the way on the other side of the continent. He was also looking for a good fuel for the rocket that would launch his satellite into orbit, something stronger than gas.

As he worked, his black tinted goggles animatedly whirring, Ai tentatively prodded. _"Boss?"_

"Hm?"

"_The Akatsuki, sir."_

Naruto paused and lifted an eyebrow. "What about them?"

"_Sir…why did you turn them down?"_

The boy snorted and shook his head, returning to scouring the globe for a good fuel source for the rocket he intended to build. "Aside from Diedara trying to blow me up, obviously bearing a grudge on me that I can't really care to find out, and how Itachi tried to put three sharingan genjutsus on me _before_ they even tried to convince me to join the Akatsuki?" their first impressions not too closely taken into account, Naruto had a valid reason for not agreeing to join.

"_Yes sir…besides all that."_ Ai wanted to clear its non-existent throat in embarrassment that it had once again overlooked something so clear. Naruto's health and safety was the computers number one priority, both of which were main concerns it had developed along with its sentience, and yet it had brushed off those things because Naruto showed he could quite manageably take care of himself against three S ranks.

"I'm wanted in all five major villages and ten countries, not because of any skills I have or even my tech but just because I'm Minato's son." Ai noticed Naruto didn't refer to the Yondaime as his father or as the Hokage, but _understandably_ disrespectfully by his name. "I have the highest grossing bounty on my head, more than any S rank I history. Itachi tried putting me under an illusion, Diedara tried blowing me up and Sasori tried poisoning me. That was before they said a word about the free space in their organization and their intention for me to join. I can't _possibly_ trust anyone that attacks first and talks civilly later and certainly not after Sasori mentioned that they were 'collecting funds to help accomplish their final plan' or how I should 'come back to the base in Ame to meet Lord Leader' so he can fill me in on the details." Naruto paused again and hummed in thought. "Last I remember, Kumo has a five hundred billion ryu bounty on my _blood_ or/and _sperm_ and Iwa has twenty billion for my decapitated head. Add that all up together and it's more than enough cash to buy a small country." he shrugged and snapped his fingers for the hologram to turn off. "I have enough on my hands at the moment. I can't bring myself to give a shit if their 'Lord Leader' is salty about my refusal to join the Akatsuki."

Paranoia and reluctance had kept him alive for such a long time.

Right now, he took down the mirror and returned it under the work table. He brought out a large blanket and laid it on the table with a small pile of bundled up clothing to be used as a make shift pillow. He threw on one more blanket onto the table and took off his gloves, placing them on top of one of the three metal boxes in the corner of the room. The box opened up and 'swallowed' the gloves, where a white light shone from the crack that had opened up, signifying that his gloves were charging. He did so with his boots and they too were 'eaten' and began charging. Finally he took off his half mask and placed it into the last rectangular metal box, where his katana blade and sheathe were already inside, charging.

"_Uhm…Boss?"_

"Yeah?" he answered, rubbing his cold feet and looked around, his burning red eyes cutting through the dim lights to check if anything was amiss.

"_Do you think the Akatsuki will come after you?"_

Naruto scoffed. "Of course they'll come after me" he closed his eyes and touched the side of his head with his pointer finger. "I'm gonna guess it's that supposed 'Lord Leader' or someone close to him he trusts that will come for my head. Hell, maybe all of them."

One thing Ai noted was that Naruto was less than afraid. Only kami knew how many S ranks were coming after him once they located him but he wasn't even close to fazed by that. Losing the S ranks was a feat all on its own. Saying 'no' to the Kage level shinobi was one thing, disappearing once again from all manner of detection was another. Naruto was an S rank killer and he had turned down the chance at joining a gang of S ranks.

Naruto snorted out a laugh as he thought over this. "Oh yeah…they'll definitely come after me."

Their pride as powerful ninjas wouldn't allow Naruto to keep living.

He clambered up the table and placed his goggles under the bundle of clothes, swaddling himself completely in warm blankets.

For a few minutes he stared at the rocky ceiling, musing for a moment.

"I know it'll reduce the power entering this cave but…activate the electrical force fields and activate the Chakra Destabilizer field." It would prevent any chakra or non-chakra based attack from reaching him and cancelled out the attacker's chakra if they touched the field. Ai gladly did so, sacrificing some power entering the large, charging battery sitting atop his wooden desk to turning on the merciless defence system. The lightning rods closest to the cave hummed with life and a transparent red sphere covered the cave like a dome; no one was around for miles to see it happen and the rain was pouring down on and around the dome so heavily that no one would see it anyway.

"_Protection Dome has been raised, boss. Power is now at thirty one percent and charging."_

"Thirty percent huh, that's…really low." The total power from the lightning rods had formerly been eighty percent; the protection dome ate a ton of power. "Turn off the lights and let the rain pass through the dome. That should increase power a bit."

"_Done. Power is now at sixty two percent and charging."_

"Better." Naruto murmured and the warmth washing over him from the heaters in the cave and the blankets he had wrapped around him lowered his eyelids slowly. He yawned and turned to his right, curling up into a ball a foetal position and tucking his head into his knees comfortably. It was two in the morning and he was dead tired. "Keep watch for me, Ai, and…and wake…me up at six in the morning. Lots…to…_yawn_…do…"

"_Yes, sir."_ Ai whispered and spread out its senses outside and inside the cave. _"Sleep well, sir."_

"Thanks buddy…" Naruto whispered with a tiny peaceful smile and Ai had never been any happier than that moment, or at least felt the simulation of a deep, glowing emotion stirring up in its circuits.

The sound of the violent storm outside lulled him to sleep.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Meanwhile, as the boy slept at ease, the outside world dug deep into his latest reappearance with the fervour of hungry animals.

Kumo and Iwa traced back to each of the boys former hideouts and tried to decipher where he would be next, sometimes scuffling with others searching for him but finally separating as more clues came up that could hopefully follow the haphazard line of movement Naruto was going in. They connected the deaths of Sasori and Diedara to the young genius and speculated that the disappearance of Kisame was also linked to Naruto somehow. Their bodies were not present; they assumed the boy wanted to cash in his bounties in a bounty station somewhere under disguise. Doing that would certainly make him richer.

They had to make sure the bounty stations were under surveillance.

The commotion and disaster they met on the former battleground, adding the nature of the S ranks deaths was enough to send chills down any ninjas' backs. The evidence was everywhere; blood, fingerprints, strands of hair, splinters, parts of puppets and clay. All from the dead ninjas but none from the boy.

They gave him credit, the boy was very thorough.

Minato had grilled Tsume Inuzuka for every detail concerning her failed retrieval mission and immediately after set her out of Konoha to look for the boy again, two hours and a verbal and written report later.

He knew what would happen to the infamous Kunoichi, clan head and mother of two if his wife had gotten wind of her return.

Hyuuga, Aburame, Nara, Yamanaka and some Inuzuka were added to the retrieval mission but were explicitly cautioned to keep their distance from the boy, as it had been shown twice that anyone near him would suddenly lose control of their body and become paralyzed.

They were grouped into specialized teams and each team was given Hirashin seal tags to summon him as soon as they found Naruto.

He had left finding Naruto in Kushina's hands and now that the reports he had gotten so far told him of Naruto's use of advanced technology that was _hundreds_ of years ahead of its time. He couldn't let his boy slip, even as Naruto had the habit of disappearing and appearing at random around the continent.

Minato discarded any care he thought he had for the boy; Naruto's birth was only to appease his wife and to have an heir to his vast wealth he had gathered before becoming Hokage from wise investments and buying sought after property with the intention of selling them when their market value went up.

Minato Namikaze was so rich it was unfathomable.

He wouldn't want anyone outside of his blood inheriting his wealth and now that Naruto had displayed the knowledge that could virtually open another sector in the market, the tech market, he was going to pool a reasonable amount of money into his boy and make even more money.

Predictably.

Minato wasn't just a shinobi of legendary status or a ninja of double S rank skill but he was a smart businessman as well.

Kami knows it wasn't Jiraiya that taught him how to make money.

The only problem with his plan was that both reports said that Naruto had no intention whatsoever to return to Konoha _alive_. The blonde Kage couldn't blame his boy for that.

His wife did things to their child on a daily basis, calling it as Acts of Her Love.

Once again, Minato didn't care, as long as Naruto remained a genius and excelled in his training.

His boy would have to suck it up and be glad that a woman of his wife's standing and stature was giving him the attention any other sane man would _literally_ kill for. She undoubtedly 'made love' with Minato from time to time, or he'd like to think she did, but the only one that could bring his wife to mind numbing completion multiple times within the same hour was their unwilling son.

Minato didn't want to brag but he had made a mess out of many women during times Kushina was uninterested with sleeping with him, so he was fairly sure he was more than good in bed.

He didn't know what Naruto did, or _if_ he did anything, but his son was going to come back to Konoha whether he liked it or not.

"Your priority is not to fight him." Minato said with his crystal blue eyes narrowed at the last squad of trackers assembled before him, the classic Hyuuga-Aburame-Inuzuka combination, and the three ninjas nodded from their subservient kneeling positions. "Locate him, confirm it is him-from a distance-" he added with a warning-threatening tone, hinting at the punishment that waited for them if they somehow fell under his boy's mysterious paralyzing tech. then there was the arsenal of abilities he could do outside of disconnecting them from their chakra reserves, like the rising water senbon or the homing water senbon Tsume Inuzuka had described. "And summon me. Do. Not. Engage." Each word was emphasized slowly. "Also, let me warn you…I'm a _very_ busy man…if I am summoned for any reason outside of seeing and confirming my boy's location…I will erase you." A corner of his right eye twitched and the three ninjas, and one ninken, ensured not to look into his eyes else they would lose what little courage they had to remain before him. "Am I understood?"

"Hai, Lord Hokage!"

"Go."

**Authors note**

**More targets on his back.**

**How do you think Naruto and his tech will match up against Minato and his man skills?**

**Some might think not joining the Akatsuki was a bad choice but in Naruto's defence, he isn't into the air of mystery and secrecy around the Akatsuki.**

**A bit hypocritical on his part but ehhhh…whatever.**

**Drop a review, would you so kindly. Stay safe wherever you are in the world and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	8. Chapter 8

**Hi!**

**Shout out to PinkiPieParty122894,flamenvy963, anthonym3, TheForgottenSuns75, Spark681 KakeruPB, shinobinoyami16, TheKing91, lord 7th, Dawood Saqlain and OverseerOfHimself. You're all wonderful :)**

**I was supposed to update yesterday but, as hard as it is to believe, I forgot what day it was. But anyway I was surprised by the positive reviews for the last chapter. I appreciate the hell out of all of you all.**

**I know this chapter will come off as farfetched and borderline unbelievable, given the things Naruto does and the amount of growth he makes but that's just how it is. He's probably not going to do what you're all thinking. Read with an open mind, is all I'm saying.**

**Little bit on the true nature of Kushina's friendship with Mikoto will also be revealed. A tiny bit. Enough of this rattling.**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 8

_06:15AM_

_Naruto's hideout_

Naruto scratched his chin and hummed, staring at a holographic projection of the famous Demon country _Tunnel to the Underworld_, which was a massive hole in the ground that pulsed with dangerous black vapour and sulphur, allegedly having molten magma at the bottom, thousands of miles down, which, when passed, opened up to the ninth and last gate of the underworld, Yami's Palace.

At the moment Naruto was only in a fresh dark purple T-shirt and black shorts with white socks on his feet. His hair was still messy from sleep and he yawned into the back of his hand sleepily, smacking his lips and taking a small sip of his morning coffee. That small sip punched some life into his eyes. His gloves and boots were still charging, seeing as he had used up a lot of their energy a few hours ago to prevent lightning from striking him, and his goggles were under his makeshift pillow though the pillow had to be pushed aside to accommodate the mirror on his work desk to make his projectors work properly.

The drone that spun around the Tunnel to the Underworld silently whizzed through the air, extra careful not to get detected by Demon country monks and Jade Wolf Yakuza members.

The genius sighed and dropped his cup of coffee, controlling the drone to perch upside down on the marble ceiling and skitter backwards into the shadows, away from sight and detection

The Tunnel to the Underworld was an important attraction to the whole country as it was supposed that Yami, the goddess of the Underworld and twin sister to Kami, goddess of the Heavens, came out from the abyss and founded Demon country to protect her loyal human followers.

That was the myth.

Naruto wasn't much of a believer.

The Tunnel was protected by a massive white and black marble temple where the shinobi trained monks worshiped Yami through the Tunnel, led by the Chief Monk of Demon country. The temple was the most important artifacts as it was what covered the Tunnel from sight; any other Yami worshipper was forbidden from entering so they had to pray from outside the temple. The second most important artefact was the_ Temple on the Mountain_, where monks went to receive lessons and training, away from civilisation and other human contact besides that of their fellow monks. Males and females of all ages could go and learn how to properly serve Yami, according to their Sacred Texts, and only if they passed through their lessons were they allowed anywhere near the Tunnel. Both places, the Tunnel and the Temple, were holy places and even those that had not qualified to be monks were fervently protective of the areas.

Anyone not of the Order of Monks was put down immediately.

Then there was the Jade Wolf.

The Leader of Demon country created an alliance with the infamous Fire country mafia to protect them from Iwa and Kumo, seeing as both villages were making dangerous advanced on the small country for reasons best known to them. The Jade Wolf weren't allowed into the temple but they patrolled outside. What they got in return for their protection were a few sacks of soot scraped from the edges of the Tunnel. The soot was a hallucinogenic drug when swallowed and it was exclusively sold outside of the mafia, as use within was prohibited at the cost of the defaulters life.

There were also rumours of a blood thirsty demon that was sealed into a tablet several levels inside the tunnel, in a cavern, but Naruto wasn't much for superstitions like demons or Yami. The closest to any demon Naruto could think of were tailed beasts and the boy had a logical explanation to their demonic-like traits and abilities, according to witness reports and real life stories from trusted documents. Naruto was a natural sceptic when it came to anything that couldn't be proved with science or technology, though he wasn't entirely close minded.

The reason he wasn't harbouring the thought of a real life from-the-underworld demon inside the Tunnel to the Underworld was that, in his mind, it wasn't something he should worry about since it was very much possible for there to be a close relative to tailed beasts mistakenly referred to as a demon. He could handle that sort of problem when it came.

Now, the reason the boy was studying images and videos from the country's most protected holy place was that he was looking for an alternative source of fuel to power his satellite rocket off the planet and into space; the rocket itself was weeks from being finished but Naruto had hit a roadblock that demanded he address the issue of fuel before he could continue. The boy couldn't use the same source of power as his drones, the sun, because it took too long to charge up enough energy that could make the rocket blast off into space-about more than half a year, to be exact-and the battery of the satellite was using solar energy and a few drops of Naruto's chakra to keep it online. The added solar energy battery that could only hope to take the rocket to space would be even more weight that had to be calculated with the weight of the massive satellite and the other parts of the rocket, all of which weighed _a lot_, creating a problem of actually lifting the rocket off the ground. Natural gas was another option but it burned too quickly after Naruto had tested it out; it would take hundreds of gallons before the rocket to enter orbit, less heavier than if he used a solar battery but no less burdensome in the lift off effort of the rocket. Petrol was in the same boat as natural gas.

It was annoying, for Naruto, that there was no such thing as rocket fuel.

The grey-blonde haired boy sighed and wrinkled his nose in mild irritation; why was it that he was the first person to ever successfully build an artificially intelligent computer? Why was he the only person that owned and controlled a small army of robot drones?

Why hadn't anyone else thought of using a concentrated liquid of Yami Soot as fuel for heavy duty equipment? The most useful thing they could come up with to use for the potent powder was as an exquisite high for the rich and affluent.

Naruto shook that irking though from his head and his fingers spread out to show a carefully analysed list of components that made up the Yami Soot. It was the perfect rocket fuel because it didn't burn quickly and Naruto only needed three sacks to make enough fuel for not only his rocket but also to power a generator for a few months straight, but Naruto didn't need a generator because he had his trusty solar energy. The only reason he was going to hoard away some of the fuel was if he ever needed to blast something else into space.

The problem of acquiring this precious, unbelievably expensive ash was that it had a 24/7 guard at all times with some of the Jade Wolf's most notorious gangsters and then there were the monks; they attacked anyone that came within reach of the temples marble pillars and they had been doing this successfully for hundreds of years, though the alliance was made when the enemies got stronger and stronger. The boy didn't want to know why an order of holy monks would ally themselves with a gang known to loot, kidnap, rape and murder indiscriminately and he honestly didn't care. The people that featured on the guard roster were names that were of mid to high A rank threat and one name stood out above the rest.

Hino Jigoku-Shiro.

Naruto's former Yakuza neighbour from the Konoha red light district.

She was the one guarding for that week, according to what he heard from the other members.

Naruto could very well take care of himself but an integral part of his plan depended on her. He only hoped she would help.

It was unlikely.

There hadn't been a supply of ash in months and it would take too much time to track a few bags of the inebriating dust, so the best option before Naruto was to take it from the source.

The continent was alight with activity.

Every nation wanted to get their hands on the runaway tech genius from Konoha, get the high bounty on the head of the Namikaze spawn or populate their villages with his sperm. If he entered the temple loud then the monks would alert the mafia, the mafia would alert their contacts in other countries, their contacts would alert their governments and their governments would swarm Demon country within half a day. If that happened then Naruto would be trapped in the country and working on his rocket would become harder seeing as there would be a manhunt on him; not even his safe place was safe.

Naruto swiped aside on the components of his intended rocket fuel and went over more videos of the monks, learning, memorizing and rehearsing their mannerisms. He did this so that when he was going through with his plan he didn't offend the people that would help him.

For once, breaking and entering wasn't going to be good for him, so he was going with the diplomatic approach.

He wanted a secret audience with the Shion, Priestess of the Land of Demons and the Supreme Leader of all of Demon country.

That was the goal.

It honestly made more sense if he smashed open the top of the temple, stole the ash and flew off to kami knows where. The boy shook that idea from his head; he didn't have the fire power at hand to hold off the continent once they got wind of him and his stamina could only go so far, especially since he was still a thirteen year old child. The satellite would help him find an uninhabited island that would give him the space to create as many weapons of mass destructions he wanted, which were a lot. The cacophonous noise of his rocket blasting off aside, he was thinking more of how he would quietly get the soot; one problem at a time.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Naruto's mother had been the cause for the boy's fear of women.

"_All good mothers that love their children do this." _She would repeatedly say as she lovingly petted his head, shining with the afterglow of another romp in his bed. _"This is how we show our love. This is how _**I**_ show my love, Naru-honey."_

This was what had warped Naruto's perception of women.

He thought that they were all sex crazed maniacs that would use any chance they had to sexually assault him for their own pleasure, never once heeding his pleas for them to stop. Mikoto knew this and, from time to time, joined in tainting Naruto's view of women. Minato knew this and allowed it to continue, giving Naruto the impression that it really was an accepted thing and that, despite Naruto calling for his help, he wouldn't listen.

With as much certainty that Naruto feared his mother, he also _**hated**_ his father.

Escaping and being immersed in the darker annals of the red light district, what his mother had been doing, that Mikoto perpetuated and Minato turned a blind eye to, was abnormal and wrong on so many levels but it did not change Naruto's opinion of females above thirteen years old.

Working in the brothel, surrounded by women of all kinds and race, this twisted understanding of the female gender was increased because a few of the women openly showed their dark lust for the prepubescent boy. The majority of the women though, conflicting Naruto's opinion, showed genuine wonder and care for the little boy that manned their bar. They swarmed him when the doors of the brothel were closed, if they were not sleeping or eating, and asked him dizzying rounds of questions that did not once swerve into the realm of his previously forced sex life. Naruto prided himself on his good natural senses-sometimes-and he could firmly attest that the sex workers that nicely spoke to him were not turned on and had never demanded sex from him. He still wasn't at ease but he didn't consider them much of a threat anymore.

The bar of fear went up from simply _every single female on the planet_-above thirteen-to every single female with any kind of combat experience. Being trained under the person he feared more than death gave him a morbid confidence in his combat skills but his terror would rear its ugly, mottled face when a woman on some fighting skill _spoke_ to him.

Hino was a nice neighbour and Naruto was scared of her.

She brought him pastries every so often and, when he refused to open his door for her, slid a manga under his door, usually a Isekai or fantasy manga about magic, adventure and escaping reality to a world that better than the one he was living in. Naruto had been raised to accept gifts, so he didn't throw them away; when he wasn't working on his weapons in the bar, he skimmed through the manga. He showed his appreciation by writing her thank you notes and, from what he noticed, she treasured his appreciation, though not in the least bit perversely. Ai saw this as progress.

Hino was not aware of his phobia but she had a niggling feeling about it.

Maybe…his bar was raised again from every female of combat skill to every female of _high_ combat skill, yet Hino still fell under this umbrella with her scary-level skills.

Encountering Orochimaru and Tsume recently and being forced back awake by his ever loyal computer friend from each encounter might have been the reason his fear bar had been raised so high.

The point was that Naruto…wasn't _as_ scare of Hino now than he was before.

The twenty one year old woman was the Jade Wolf mafia's main enforcer. She stood at five foot six with a lithe, trim and well-toned build gotten from years of formerly being the assistant commander of the Konoha ANBU, second only to Shikaku Nara. Naruto had done some light background research on Hino. Hino was an orphan that had been a sort of big sister figure in the orphanage. The poor state of the orphanage due to lack of funds from the village and understaffing forced the older children to more or less cater for their wellbeing. Up until she was nineteen and an active Kunoichi, as well as assistant commander, she had been going back and forth between her duties as a ninja and her self-appointed duties as a big sister. A big fire broke out and several of the children lost their lives in the inferno because help did not come on time and the gas cylinders that had started the fire were the very same ones used _before_ she was born. Combining all the other things she had seen as a ninja of the Leaf, she lost faith in the village and quit, becoming a member of the Fire country mafia soon after. Her story wasn't all that particularly interesting. As her neighbour of one year at the time, Naruto had noticed her shift in allegiance but her-for lack of a better word-_fixation_ of looking after him in any way he allowed didn't change.

His drones had located her home west of the Tunnel, among the small cluster of small homes that surrounded the revered spot.

Hino sighed tiredly and pushed open her front door, closing it behind her with a light kick from her left heel. She ran a frustrated hand through her short black hair and gingerly took off her black suit coat, tossing it away from her and rigidly tugging off her long red tie, grunting with displeasure as she accidentally tightened it a bit. It was two hours before midday, so there was plenty of natural light in her house. She liked to live modestly, in spite of the piles of cash she was paid regularly directly from the Yakuza boss himself; three light blue, modest chairs and one equally blue couch with a plain black carpet spread out on the floor of each room, besides the white tiled kitchen, and a black flat screen sat on a stand before the couch. There was a large window behind two of the smaller chairs that showed a magnificent view of the temple protecting the Tunnel and it was even better when the sun rose and bathed the glorious white temple in its ethereal soft orange light. Hino undid her leather belt and discarded it like her coat; she didn't really object to the black suit and red tie getup of the mafia as her own uniform was tailored made for her form but there were days she preferred wearing her own clothes. Unfortunately, when she was on a high profile job like guarding the Tunnel she had to wear the Yakuza uniform, and as she was one of the five enforcers, the Head Enforcer, for the Fire country mafia her own uniform differed slightly to that of the rest of her subordinates; she wore a pitch black suit with a black suit shirt and red tie with red gloves, polished black shoes and red socks. Her only superior, the boss, didn't dislike her dark, Goth-like makeup and even if he did she would have still had it on.

She mumbled incoherently and passed the back of the couch, eyeing the coffee table in the middle of the assembled chairs briefly with narrowed eyes and her lips quirked down ever so slightly. It could hardly be seen but the thin sheen of dust had a circular break on it, like a cup had been placed there recently. She instinctively looked down and her eyebrows furrowed when she saw no footprints. Hino shrugged and took off her red gloves, stashing them in her back pocket and unbuttoning the top two buttons of her long sleeved black suit shirt, revealing a white and black striped vest. Her ears twitched when she heard the wooden chair in the kitchen scrape against the ground, a sound so quick and so quiet anyone other than her could have missed it.

Her skills kicked in and she slipped to the side of the door, hiding her presence and taking off the rest of her long sleeved shirt. Her striped vest hugged her form and her arms, one of which was littered with neat yellow, blue, red and black Yakuza sleeve tattoos and the other a normal, albeit pale arm, reached behind her and tugged out a pair of short knives from their sheathes. She brought them forward and clenched her teeth, breathing out once and spinning around into the kitchen.

No one.

There was nothing out of place.

That is, except for the six foot long metal case sitting on her kitchen counter. It hummed lightly and the edges shone with thin white light. Hino was a chakra sensor but her natural senses were sharp, and she did not notice any sign of life in her whole house. She cautiously approached the case and was about to poke it with her right blade until-

"Don't do that…for your health's sake." A voice said behind her and she whirled around, lowering her centre of gravity and getting into a fighting style she had learnt under Shikaku Nara when she was still in the ANBU. Hino saw a pair of hands poke out from the doorframe of her kitchen, the person clearly wanted her to know that he was unarmed. His left hand bent forward and pointed past Hino, at the box on the counter. "The charger's self-defence would automatically kick in and you'll be put under roughly a hundred and fifty volts of electricity." Hino couldn't help but raise an eyebrow when the person mentioned 'charger' and how familiar the voice sounded. "I am unarmed."

"Come out." she ordered and gripped her knives tighter. "Now!"

"Ok, ok…" the person took a step out from his cover, his hands still raised, and Hino's eyebrows shot into her hairline, her hands dropped to her side weakly and her mouth dropped.

"Kyohi?"

Like anyone else in Konoha, they found out that the green haired bartender was actually the runaway son of the Yondaime and only after the whole mess that was his attempted kidnapping and maiming Kakashi. Looking at him now, only some months after, he seemed completely different.

He had grey-blonde hair and he was in a pair of black shorts that had no pockets and a plain green shirt. His bare feet wiggled in the carpeted floor. He also had a pair of thick rectangular goggles slung around his neck. He winced when she swept her stormy grey eyes over him and lifted his shoulders into a shrug.

"Hi."

He wasn't noticeably shaking, she realized, and in her daze she blindly sheathed her knives. His still raised hands pointed at the case on the counter again but this time he nodded at it. It hissed and she turned around to look, seeing that a pair of boots and gloves lay inside; the white light came from the edges and three wires per glove and boot were connected to those edges. Her eyes sparked with recognition when she saw a silver katana lying on the upper side of the box, though connected to five wires-four at the handle and one on the tip of the blade.

"Those are my weapons." Kyohi-Naruto-said, bringing her attention back to him. "I'm only here to talk-"

Without faltering, Hino rushed forward and swept the boy into a tight hug. Naruto flinched and fought down the urge to paralyze her with a destabilizer. Hino ran through a slur of words and he could only gather that she was worried sick, angry he left without so much as a goodbye, scared he had been captured by Orochimaru when no one had seen him for months and pissed off when he didn't confide in her that he was the child of the Hokage.

"Wasn't expecting th_is-_" he wheezed when she tightened her arms around him. "But I'm just gonna roll with it." he wiggled his arms free and placed two firm hands on both of her shoulders, pushing her away. His face was stony, fighting for any sort of smile and making it come off as painful, saying. "I know how this sounds-avoiding you for years back in Konoha and running off without a proper farewell-and then tracking you down in Demon country-"

Her eyebrows shot up into her hairline and she looked at him incredulously. "Tracking me down in Demon country?"

He waved away her surprise. "You're a very hard person to find, believe me." he could see the swirl of questions in her head and he decided to give her some time to reorient herself. Even for being a former jounin, this was a whiplash of revelations; finding out he was the Yondaime's son months ago, flickering about from Waterfall country to Wind country and finally ending up in Demon country with the stealth that most likely should not be used by one his age, and now he had sought her out himself and it wasn't for her head, apparently. He swept aside and motioned into the kitchen, where a steaming pile of cookies laid on a ceramic plate. She was certain it hadn't been there before, or else she would have smelt this tantalizing aroma wafting from the chocolate chip cookies. "I got those in the bakery down the road a few minutes ago, a sort of house warming present from me," he looked at her with his eyebrows wrinkled curiously. "This is your second day here, right?"

The woman gawked at the cookies, just now realizing that the scent had been permeating the room ever since. She swivelled back to the boy, who was looking at her with a raised eyebrow. "How are you doing this?"

"Doing what?"

This…_kid_ had the audacity to not know what she was talking about. She waved at the cookies and at him. "Those things weren't there before. Not even Konoha trackers know where I am either." The thirteen year old boy was definitely different than she remember, because he smiled slightly, not shivering in the least, and padded past her on his bare feet into the kitchen, hopping onto a stool on the island counter. The rectangular boxes hummed as he approached but quietened down as he took his seat.

He touched the edge of the ceramic plate with his pointer finger. "There are two magnets under the plate that I control through my goggles." He demonstrated by shifting the ceramic plate about on the counter, ensuring to avoid the boxes and even making it levitate once off the counter before it clinked back down. He then jabbed his thumb at her kitchen window, which was now open, adding more surprise to her mounting list of surprises. "While you were distracted with…hugging me…I used the magnets in my goggles and on the plates to open the metal bolts on your window and flew the plate in. It's…" he scratched his head and winced at his babbling. "Actually a lot simpler than it sounds. I'm personally not sure why I did all that, instead of just giving you the cookies, but all this was to help you get used to my tech."

Her mouth opened, then closed, then opened again, only to close once more. The boy sighed, placed his elbows onto the counter and propped his head on his palms; maybe…he should have gone with the direct approach.

He wondered how she would react if he told her about his satellite.

He snorted and waited for Hino to collect herself.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Kushina drove her knee into Tsume's stomach and cracked her elbow down into the back of her neck, smashing her into the solid stone of training ground 11.

"You tho_ught I won't __**find you, bitch**_." The feral woman spat hatefully, her hair barely flailing as she struggled not to fully lose control of her rage. "Did you really think that, fucking animal."

Mikoto's eyebrows crinkled worryingly and she inched towards her best friend. "Take it easy, Kushina." He snapped back at step when the enraged woman spun to her, her purple eyes wide and tormented, filled with the souls of those that had fallen at her hands. Her face morphed into a dangerous snarl and the strong Uchiha Kunoichi held up one hand for the woman to calm down, motioning to the panting, wrapped up form of the injured Inuzuka Kunoichi. "She's already hurt…_please_."

The redhead inhaled deeply and runs a rough hand through her hair, turning away from both women with her eyes and counting to twenty. On fifteen she was finally calm enough to create a coherent though and she turned around to the wheezing dog woman on the ground and kicked her torso, sending the woman careening on the ground, crashing through three trees and flopping before the manmade lake of the training ground.

Mikoto gasped in surprise. "Kushina!"

The Uzumaki waved flippantly. "She's _fine_~" She began skipping to where the bloody, battered body of the proud clan head laid. The Uchiha grumbled and fell silently, plodding after her friend with her arm crossed. "She failed her mission. Dogs need to be punished."

"It wasn't her fault. Naruto just got the jump on her."

Kushina giggled into her hand, a dark sound that send tendrils of fear down the black eyed Kunoichi's back. "She had prior knowledge of some of the things my son can do, enough to preserve her health _and_ the mission, and seeing as she was dumb enough to forget what happened to Kakashi she got her ass handed to her." They reached the Inuzuka, who was panting and shakily pushing herself onto her knees, moaning under her breath at the throbbing pain. She yowled when a hand threaded through her hair and pulled, taking her knees off the ground but still too pained to put her feet under her. Tsume whimpered and futilely tried to pry the Uzumaki's hand out of her hair. A condescending pair of eyes captivated her and Kushina's light purple painted lips curled up into a smirk. "Tsume's a brainless crossbreed for not thinking, or am I wrong?"

"…No…Mistress."

Kushina's eyes widened and her other hand reared back to punch the Inuzuka in her stomach. "Is that _defiance_ I hear, you filthy mutt?"

"No, mistress."

"Good." she released the clan head. She walked around the wreck of limbs that used to the dog woman, to the manmade lake, and spoke to Mikoto over her shoulder. "Yugao told me my husband is sending out tracking teams to find my son." She was joined by Mikoto to her left and the woman tilted her head towards her friend. "Is there anyone from your clan in those squads?"

"No, though I heard that those teams aren't to engage Naruto but to summon Minato once they confirm Naruto's location."

Kushina hummed with a small, elegant frown. "I was thinking of sending you out to find my son," she saw the bright sparkles in Mikoto's eyes at her best friends thought. "But my son will be able to sense you as easily as he would sense me." The hope of impressing her 'best friend' died in her eyes. "Besides…only kami knows what secret weapons my son has that Tsume was unable to find out. You won't stand a chance."

Mikoto raised up a finger and said. "But-"

Kushina shot a single look at her, one scathing look that dared the Uchiha to say something to contradict her decision.

The Uchiha clan heads finger deflated and she cleared her throat to regain what authority she had. "Whatever."

The Uzumaki princess tapped her chin in thought, reaching a brick wall she hoped to never encounter in her search of finding her boy; missing ninjas failed, Konoha ninjas failed.

Everyone failed.

"My son might have some kind of tech that could hide his presence and sense everything in the environment…" she sighed heavily. "I think the only thing I can do is wait for news from those trackers."

Mikoto whirled around when they heard a sultry, hissing laugh from behind them, brandishing a tanto and pointing it at the only other person in the training ground, besides Tsume.

Kushina only hummed and cocked an eyebrow at her senses identified the disgusting, green chakra behind her. Mikoto met the newcomers eyes with her back straight, unshaking, not in the least bit intimidated.

The woman looked over her shoulder and said in a dull voice.

"Orochimaru."

The Sannin, coming in the same female form he was in when he first met Naruto, smiled sweetly. "Now is that any way to talk to an old friend."

The Uchiha stayed tense, watching the snake like a hawk. Her friend still didn't care much that her self-titled 'old friend' was there. "What do you want, Orochimaru? I'm not in the mood for games."

The snake woman blew out a sad air, disappointed. "Come now-"

"Orochi." Kushina muttered threateningly. "You have ten seconds to give me a valid reason not to take your head down to T&I." Mikoto didn't need to remember how appalled Kushina had been at Orochimaru's crimes and how personally offended her best friend was. The Uchiha Kunoichi flinched when Kushina growled in a low voice. "_Nine_-"

"I have a way to sneak up on Naruto." She brought out a phial filled halfway with a murky brown liquid, swishing it around in front of the inquisitive Uzumaki. Her interested piqued, Kushina slowly turned around and cocked her head to the side.

"…I'm listening…"

**Authors note**

**And yes, Kushina and Mikoto know there are going to be strings attached to Orochimaru's (Orochimara's) offer**

**The next chapter for this story isn't ready for…unpredictable reasons, and so I will either update ****Ten Tails of Hunger and Chaos**** or start another story entirely. I'm thinking of another crossover story.**

**Drop a review, would you so kindly. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world and I will see you when I see you :)**

**Foy.**


	9. Chapter 9

**Ello!**

**Shout out to TheKing91, anthonym3, aishi, Spark681, zerkses, Chiizzz (thanks!), PinkiePieParty122894 (patience is a virtue, mah dude. Thanks for the review!), Saiyan prince1 and Ybarra87 (that's a good idea. I'll think about it, and thanks for your thoughts!). You're all wonderful people :)**

**I was behind on writing this chapter and I don't want to post a new story, not just yet, so I did some quick (sugar crazed) typing to get it ready.**

**Hope you all enjoy reading it…**

CHAPTER 9

Hino fixed Naruto with a strong look, an odd mixture of wonder and bewilderment.

"Lemme get this straight," she started, when Naruto had finished saying his request and had settled back, chomping down on the cookies he had bought. "You want me to set up a meeting with The Priestess of Demon country so that you can ask for some Yomi ash to power a rocket invention of yours to outer space."

"Yeah, that sounds about it."

She chuckled and rubbed her eyes. "I might have called you crazy to think you can launch a ship into space but," she motioned to the buzzing boxes on the island counter. "You've clearly been holding back on me."

"I'm obligated to have my secrets-"

She hastily raised her hands to calm him down. "Hey, hey, I'm not judging. I'm not asking you to pour out all your secrets. I've got secrets too." Naruto hid his smirk behind a fairly large cookie, drifting his eyes to the window so she couldn't see his expression. It might not have been comprehensive, but he was sure he knew a fair bit about Hino Jigoku-Shiro, ex-jounin, former deputy ANBU commander and Top Enforcer for the Fire country mafia. She eyed him suspiciously and pushed past _that_ talking point. "Ok, I've got a question."

"Shoot."

"If you've got all this tech and all your robots and whatever…why don't you use them to threaten the Priestess or take her hostage so she'll _have_ to give you the ash?"

"My reason-and I wish I was underestimating this-is that the whole world is looking for me. There's no way I can sneak into her palace and hold her hostage without anyone finding out; I don't have that kind of stealth technology." He saw her eyes move to the holographic projection of the Tunnel beaming out from his goggles. "This drone doesn't have any defensive or offensive weapons on it; it's supposed to be light and quiet and weapons would only make it loud and clumsy."

Hino conceded to him, mainly because she didn't want to confuse herself thinking about Naruto's tech.

"What do you say? I'll owe you one."

She stared at Naruto for a minute, mulling things over in her head, then she said. "I can get you to the Priestess…"

Naruto saw it coming. "But…?"

"You're still the most wanted kid on the planet. You're bound to be recognized by the guards."

That didn't seem to be a problem when they arrived at the palace.

The guards, wearing heavy looking samurai armour over billowing white robes and priest headpieces, gave them one look-the leader of the current Yakuza guards and a grey-blonde haired boy in simple, unremarkable clothes and black rimmed, tinted goggles hanging from his neck-and allowed them in. Naruto looked own on his plain blue shirt and black shorts with white trainers, then to his goggles, making sure nothing was out of place. His feet blindly followed the handmaiden leading them through the corridor into the throne room.

"Is he here yet?" a voice squeaked far in front of him and the boy looked up, seeing a girl close to his age standing before a full body mirror and straightening her light blonde hair and adjusting her golden crown. She was in a lavender kimono with a short white half shirt underneath, shown from the open from of her kimono. She also had red sandals on her feet. The reflection of her pale lavender eyes sparked as they fell on him. She whirled around; her face flushed a deep shade of red and her eyes wide in surprise. "Ah, err, uhh…"

Naruto regarded the Daimyo of Demon country with a blank, emotionless look, and the girl blubbered on, even as two of her handmaidens took away the standing mirror. He bowed, his eyes lowered to the ground like how he had been taught to address a superior political power. "Greetings, Lady Shion, I am-"

"Lord Uzumaki Naruto!"

The boy snapped back up, his eyes briefly narrowing at her exclamation. Being the son of the Yondaime didn't make him royalty; being the son of the Princess of Whirlpool, a nation that had formerly been more powerful than more than half of the continent, was what made him a noble. The girl's attendants and guards looked at the girl, utterly confused and unsure of what to do with the information that it was the globally wanted standing before them.

"Ah, my apologies, Lord Naruto-"

"Just…Naruto is fine, my lady."

The girl giggled airily into her hand and swept around her throne, descending the stairs with elegant, trained steps. "If that's so then please, call me Shion."

Naruto held down his uncaring shrug. "Sure." His eyebrows steadily climbed up his forehead when she got closer and closer, only stopping two and a half feet from him and biting her bottom lip, blinking at him with innocent purple eyes. Naruto brought his mind back on track. "I came to ask something of you, Lady-I mean-Shion."

She leaned in towards the disguised blonde, an action that had the boy leaning back just as much, and whispered. "I know why you're here, Naruto. I've been waiting for you since yesterday." This piqued Hino's interest and she asked.

"Does it have to do with that freaky future predicting thing I hear you can do?"

'_Future prediction?'_ Naruto thought.

Shion cleared her throat contemptuously. "Can you please give us some space?" she sent a hard look to one of her guards, saying. "You all too." The guards and attendants filed out mutely and she inched closer to Naruto, who stepped back. "Don't worry, they won't tell anyone you're here."

"Hino…I'll meet up with you at your place." the red eyed boy was not looking at the Yakuza lady but rather keeping a wary on the overly familiar priestess. He sensed her indecisiveness and added. "Don't worry about me."

The woman took cautious steps back, nodded once, and went into the corridor leading to the entrance.

"You…know why I'm here." He stated carefully and her head bobbed up and down. "Then how much do you want for three bags of ash-"

"You're a lot cuter up close." She blurted out, her cheeks tinged red but she beamed at him, devoid of much shame.

"…Excuse me?"

"I've been watching you for a while." Not that _that_ didn't sound any creepier…

"Didn't you say since yesterday?" Naruto leaped over the aforementioned 'Future Prediction' the girl apparently had, which was among the things he had investigated on with his drone's initial investigation mission. Just like with the demon in the Tunnel, he also didn't take too much interest in the popularly acclaimed ability of the Priestess of Demon country.

"I said I _knew_ you were coming here since yesterday." She clarified. "Ever since you killed Kisame, I've had my scouts keep tabs on you. You're…a very elusive guy, Naruto, really mysterious, like a real ninja; even _I_ couldn't pinpoint your exact location." She looked over him and her eyes shortly drooped with disappointment when she realized the only tech on his person were his goggles. "The things you're able to do, with and without your weapons, is simply…_awe inspiring_." She slid up to him and the boy easily moved back. Her eyebrows crinkled with confusion at him avoiding her advances.

For as long as she could remember, she hadn't ever truly taken any particular interest in anyone. The fifteen year old girl was withdrawn and, to some, haughty, and this dissuaded boys from looking at her in any other way other than as the daimyo of the country. She too didn't find anyone extraordinary enough.

The vision of a boy with varying hair colour struck her on three occasions; one was when he had killed the S ranked ninja, Kisame, the Zero Tailed Beast, and fatally maimed Kakashi of the Sharingan. The next was him, with death himself hovering behind the boy, murdering two more S ranks, Sasori of the Red Sands and the Mad Bomber, Diedara. The third was of him standing in his hideout in her country, death chortling over his shoulder as he stared at a glowing projection of the Tunnel to the Underworld, plotting how he could get his hands on some Yomi ash.

Demon country was matriarchal, since its founding, and no male was ever to take the seat of power else summon the wrath of the goddess of the underworld. Shion's mother had always told her stories of how she would one day find a male of outstanding qualities, through her own predictions, that would sweep her off her feet and give her his essence so that she, Shion, too would bear her own daughter that would one day rule the whole country.

The girl well and truly believed that it was Naruto her mother had been referring to.

He was strong, smart, skilled and, she hoped, compassionate, somewhere behind his Fortress of Technology.

Her first instinct was to, _politely_, ask him for his semen so that she would bear a strong heiress to the throne and, maybe one day, follow Naruto to wherever he wanted to go, but…she stopped herself.

Disgust crawled its way onto Naruto's face and his lips quivered with a growl.

"What did you just say?"

…Oh…

Ah…

She might have…accidentally…let it slip out.

"I-I-I'm sorry! I-"

"No, no, no, _I'm_ the one mistaken here. I should just kill you and take the ash from under your throne. So much for my plan." So much for thinking that all girls weren't the same. Ai was the one that informed Naruto, after a scan of the room, that there was a large space underneath the throne that had small particles of Yami ash in the air, not enough to intoxicate but enough to dizzy. The girl stumbled back as the red eyed boy walked up to her with clipped steps, he caught her by the her collar, clenching it with one hand and deftly holding her from falling onto the ground, glaring down at her with what she could only describe as an dark frown. "I was personally hoping that one your age and status would be better than this."

She saw Death cackling behind him and she knew, there and then, that he was going to kill her.

Her death would be so inconsequential to him it won't even be on his conscience.

"Wait!" she screamed, raising her hand up to him and begging him not to crack his other fist into her forehead with a _Steam Scorpion strike_ that would undoubtedly jar her brain in her skull. "I didn't mean it like that!"

"Oh yeah? What other way do you mean by 'I want your semen'?" he looked at her with tightly controlled wild eyes. "Have you forgotten how young you are?"

She was waving her hand, pitifully, futilely trying to grab the fist that would end her life, wailing. "I-Its tradition for the Daimyo to bear a child with a s-strong male-" this didn't seem to appease the boy, not in the least and his left fist cracked, pulled backwards and ready to be let loose on her head. She clasped her hands together in prayer, closed her eyes tightly and bawled. "I'm your biggest fan!"

An inch from her forehead, Naruto's fist came to a screeching halt. He observed her teary face, the snot bubbling from her nose and her quibbling lips, trembling with pleas for mercy.

"I didn't m-mean anything b-bad, h-honest! Y-Y-Yami knows my heart; I do not hold any sinful emotions towards you! I swear!" tears flowed down her face as she cried, begging for mercy and praying for her life. Her body shook like a leaf in a thunder storm and her voice stuttered with so much panic that even one as withdrawn as Naruto felt sorry for her. He could go as far as say that he felt…_bad_ for putting her in this helpless state. His fist lowered a notch, but she didn't see it. "I-I am only a humble servant of My Lady Yami! And on her name I swear-I swear, I am your biggest fan!"

There really wasn't any way for a leader of a country to say 'I want your semen' that wouldn't have been seen as bad. Naruto blinked multiple times and rationalized his thoughts. He inhaled deeply through his nose and exhaled slowly, closing his eyes to centre himself again. He opened them and pulled the girl onto her feet. He readjusted her golden crown, dusted down his shoulders and flicked an errant blonde hair away from her face, and after a few short seconds of looking over her, Naruto retrieved a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed the Priestess's damp forehead, touching the tears from under her eyes and lightly running it under her nose, wiping away the snot. When he was sure she was presentable, he eyed her with an empty look, standing back to make sure he didn't miss anything.

If she wet herself then that was her own business.

The girls knees were knocking against each other and her eyes were clenched shut, her hands still laced in hopeful prayer that she wasn't going to die in her throne room.

"How much do you want for three bags of Yomi ash." Naruto asked, simple and easy.

The girls eyes snapped open and she answered. "You-You don't have to w-worry about p-paying me. You can ha-have as m-much as you w-want, I don't mind; you see, I've-I've got more than-than enough money, hahaha-" she babbled and laughed awkwardly to herself, her stuttering not getting that much better. Naruto interrupted her.

"I'll ask again…how much do you want for three bags of Yomi ash?"

Shion saw how serious Naruto was and gulped. "Y-You can-can have th-them for one thousand r-ryu per bag, and I'll-I'll-I'll even throw in one e-extra-"

"Three's fine. Thank you." Naruto handed her the handkerchief and riffled through his pockets again, pulling out a small, palm sized scroll, he unsealed a crude black leather wallet and put the scroll back into his pocket. He counted out three bills for the scared priestess and, when she didn't move to take the money, he gingerly took her small hand into his own and pushed the three one thousand ryu bills into her hand. He curled her hand to hold the money tightly and pressed on. "The ash…_please_."

The fifteen year old daimyo bustled over to her throne, with the thirteen year old genius following behind her at a leisurely pace, and, still gripping the ryu notes in her hand with all her might, inhaled deeply, held her breath and pushed the foot of her throne back. She blindly reached in with her other hand and, one at a time, pulled out three bags. She made to pull out a fourth bag but a strong cough stilled her hand. She closed the opening and turned around; Naruto was just about sealing the third and last bag of ash into a different scroll.

He bowed to her once and turned around unceremoniously. "Bye."

Shion chewed her bottom lip nervously, then she called. "Uhm, Naruto?"

The boy grunted, not stopping.

"I wasn't lying, y'know…when I said I was your biggest fan." She rushed over to him as quickly as her kimono allowed. He grunted again at her last statement. "I didn't mean to sound rude before," she ran in front of him and he was forced to stop, a few more steps before he could enter the corridor towards the entrance. Suddenly finding her courage, Shion looked up at the boy and Naruto looked back down at her, his blood red eyes hard and noncommittal. Looking up into his impassive face, her stutter returned with full, unforgiving force. "Can-can we at l-least be friends…? P-P-Pen pals…m-maybe…"

Naruto tilted his head to the side, studying the priestess with a lopsided smile, not truly smiling and not truly frowning. He placed both of his hands on her shoulder and her heart leaped up into her throat but then he gently moved her aside. He walked past her. "Don't look for me. I was never here."

Her right hand shot to her heart when she heard it shatter. Then a bright smile grew on her face and she called after him again, saying. "I'll-I'll…take that as a yes!"

The boy didn't deem her an answer, only pushing open the great doors and walking out into the bright midday sunlight. The doors closed with a mighty slam and the girl, the Daimyo of Demon country, pumped her fist to the side and whispered with a girly giggle.

"Wait till I tell the girls." She skipped away and went back to her throne, slumping onto it with a heavy sigh. She tried to control her breathing, her hand placed on her chest in a vain attempt at stopping her heart from exploding.

She was _so_ happy.

Her smile faded and she finally winced. "That didn't go as I expected."

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Thirty minutes later_

_Naruto's Cliff Hideout_

_Demon country_

Smoke billowed around Naruto.

The runaway squinted behind his goggles, staring into the large cauldron of bubbling liquid and hefting up another sack of ash onto his shoulder, ready to pour it into the large pot. His half face mask made sure to filter out any toxic air and his goggles protected his eyes from being burned by the sulphuric, melting heat of the mixture. The storm raging outside of the rock erected walls threatened to flatten the makeshift building down on him but managed to hold firm under the pressure. Unlike with that morning when he went to Hino's house and to the daimyos palace, it wasn't a moment of weather peace.

Naruto was currently just a stone throw from his hideout with a large pot of fresh water boiling over a low heat coming from a gas stove. He had just poured in a whole bag of Yomi ash into the water and the result was noxious smoke. The boy slowly tipped more powder into the water, instinctively holding his breath when smoke erupted up again and wafted out from the small holes at the side of the building, lost in the rain outside. When he finished he picked up a crude bar of metal and jammed it into the thin liquid mixture, stirring it as gently as possible so as not to tip the contents of the pot onto himself or the floor; that surely would be disastrous. His gloved hands struggled to churn the gradually thickening mixture, even with the added power of his computer gloves, and he stopped mixing after five minutes, adding the last bag of ash into the pot. He stepped back and cleaning robot whizzed into the small hut, grabbing onto the iron bar defiantly, stubborn despite the liquid hellfire spraying on it from the pot, and continued the stirring.

"Give it an hour before you take it off the fire." The robot beeped loudly, even though it had been Ai Naruto had spoken to. Naruto predicted that the mixture would become a thick as tar in the next ten minutes but then, under the slow, even fire from the gas stove; it would gradually become thinner and thinner. The boy calculated that two gallons of 'Rocket fuel' would be enough to take his satellite into space.

He put on his rain poncho and stomped out from the crude, makeshift laboratory towards his hideout.

"The last few things I need before I finish my satellite are in Kumo." Naruto said aloud to Ai, muted by his half mask. "Prepare my katana and my combat drones; keep the suicide drones in the base until I ask for them."

"_Yes, sir."_

The combat drones could not be compacted into anything smaller than twice the height of an average adult and twice the size of an average Akimichi shinobi, hence Naruto's next order. "They're too many and too heavy for me to carry all at once, so move them to Kai village in Lightning country; it's best if I have them close by, just in case."

Ai couldn't have agreed more to its master's logic. _"Of course, sir."_ It went about stacking the folded up combat drones-alpha, beta, gamma and delta-on top of each other, all in their cubical, compacted forms, and they zipped out from the front of the hideout just as Naruto opened the door. Lightning arced down from the sky and struck a few flying metal boxes but the drones weren't brought down, or slowed down for that matter. _"Shall I still keep the _Beta Fire_ drone and _Suicide_ drone with Hino operational?"_

Naruto entered the hideout and slammed the door shut, breathing out a sigh of relief at the feeling of _not_ being pelted by rain. "The strain of dividing your attention huh," Naruto mumbled, clicking off his half mask but keeping his goggles over his eyes. "Activate _Flight Mode: Auto-Detect and Defend_ and switch off their main cores but make sure their secondary reserves are at a hundred percent for both those drones." It was a mode on all his drones that Naruto had personally programmed that would have the robots deactivated until they sensed any form of danger near their charge.

All the way back in her apartment, close to the Tunnel, Hino flinched when the two robots Naruto had gifted her clanked and creaked, gently dropping onto the ground and sliding back into a corner of her living room, folding themselves into two by two foot cubes. All sounds stopped and the mafia enforcer stared warily at the deactivated boxes; Naruto had given them in gratitude for her help. They were strictly to protect her at all costs. She didn't understand a single thing about how to maintain them and when Naruto had noticed, he told her not to worry about it, that they could take care of themselves and her too.

Ai's connection to the drones currently with Hino was subsequently cut, until the event of imminent danger to the mafia enforcer. Basically, the drones were dead to the world, even to Ai and Naruto, until they sensed danger in Hino's immediate vicinity and if the woman was to leave Demon country then the drones were to follow stealthily, or as stealthily non-stealth robots could be. Of course, Hino had argued that she didn't need any kind if protecting, not to talk about one from two inventions of a thirteen year old boy, but Naruto had insisted.

She finally caved.

Ai spoke up when Naruto had been silently shuffling down the dark hallway leading into his hideout. _"Sir?"_

"Yes, Ai?"

"_Do you want me to have your cleaning drones pack your clothes and fly them to Kai village? Without the added load of your clothes, you will be able to move more swiftly and in the course of an unavoidable ambush,"_ which was unlikely with Ai and Naruto's combined sensory abilities. _"You will have more manoeuvrability."_

"Good idea. Just leave the lightning conductors and my satellite battery; two more days before it's fully charged." The chances of the conductors being seen were already slim, seeing as Naruto was miles from the nearest human settlement in Demon country, all the way on a cliff east of the religious nation, so the inventor wasn't too worried of his base being found and robbed. Ai went about, controlling the cleaning robots like puppets to pack Naruto's clothes, shoes, scrolls and sweeping the interior for any signs of its master's presence. Naruto didn't have an official name for his cleaning robots, unlike his Reconnaissance, Combat and Suicide drones, or a subcategory, like the Alpha-Beta-Gamma-Delta series of his Combat and Suicide drones. Hell, they were more like drones with extendable arms that held four controllable fingers and a slight protrusion with two blue lights serving as their head and eyes respectively. Naruto often called them his Cleaning robots but that named didn't feel right for some mysterious reason his reconnaissance drones were a new addition to his growing army of drones and they were largely unarmed and harmless, expect when they were to sneak past enemy lines to scout out the terrain or a building. They were light and fast and also disposable, loaded with a small bomb to self-destruct if they were ever discovered or caught. The spying robot had been more easily named than the cleaning robot. Naruto shook his head and discarded the errant thought; he had better things to worry about. "This storm should last another five days before it lets up, right?"

"_That is correct, boss."_

"Good." the boy went about his apartment, dodging and avoiding the cleaning robots as they arranged his stuff. The unscrewed themselves from the ceiling, leaving only one for Ai's master to use, and the holographic projectors were also taken down by the cleaning robots, neatly kept inside a large five by three foot metal box, larger than the ones Naruto used to charge his gloves, boots and sword. The boy turned his right hand palm up and the red palm of his glove glowed at his mental command, forming a coloured holographic screen before his eyes. "Ai, how's your processing speed now?"

Understanding that Naruto meant that now that the drones with Hino were not operational, the super computer aptly answered, _"At optimal levels, boss."_

"Processing power."

"_Now at ninety one percent, boss. Optimal."_

"Storage capacity."

"_At forty percent. I recommend backing up and discarding nonessential data. Including: out-dated schematics, inconsequential information on late shinobi, unimportant videos gotten from your drones and, may I add, there is a backlog of data that cannot be properly processed dating back to when you were still in Konoha."_

Naruto's eyebrows furrowed. "Data like what?"

"_Old transactions and calculations that, as of now, are obsolete in comparison to your current calculations."_

Naruto shook his head with an amused smile. "Tell me, Ai, if I erased the knowledge that one plus one equals two, then do you think that your foundation of further mathematics, or calculations in general, would remain stable?" Naruto saw the small circular ball on the bottom left corner of the inside of his goggles falter for a split second and he hummed out a laugh. He found it funny that his super computer thought that basic calculations like that were no longer necessary due to the level of calculations he was performing now. Was it, perhaps, because Ai was getting overconfident in its intelligence? Probably. "Well?"

"_No sir. My apologies, sir."_

"You too, Ai, are built on a mountain of simple numbers that, when combined, become complex and almost indecipherable. If smaller calculations are thrown out then you will lose a great chunk of what makes you, you. Understand what I'm saying?"

"_Yes, sir, perfectly. It would be best if I treasured basic calculations else I would not remember who I am…?"_ it said sceptically and Naruto chuckled again, soft and tired.

"Close. You'll understand with time."

Ai cleared its absent throat, feeling a simulation of what it could only guess was morbid embarrassment. _"Boss…do you wish to clear some space in my memory?"_

"I think your overdue for another update, buddy." Naruto replied with a slight smile.

Ai sounded unsure. _"Then I would have to deactivate your cleaning robots. They are five minutes before they are done packing and cleaning."_

Naruto took off his goggles and placed them onto his worktable, the tinted screen facing him. He laid his gloves on either side of the goggles, palm up, and pressed the tip of his pointer finger on the screen of his goggles, on the right. "Don't worry, this won't disrupt much."

"_If I may be so forward as to ask, what is the update, boss?"_

"Self-repair and Auto-reactivation," Naruto responded. "For when any of my drones are broken and I'm not available to repair them. You will have full access to their schematics to repair them yourself."

"_Ah, but sir, do you think I'm ready for that update?"_

Naruto's smiled again, more amused than anything. "I won't be giving you if I didn't think you're ready." His fingerprint unlocked the outer screen and a large coloured holographic projection beamed out from the visors. This one was roughly spherical in shape, roughly being that it warbled with numbers and fast moving information; this Ai's brain. The boy picked at a part of his super computers brain and tapped in a special password, authorizing Ai to see-without his command-schematics of all his inventions. From drones to his gloves, his boots, his sword and even his chargers, everything was laid out for the robot. This freed up some space since Ai didn't have to erect a barricade between itself and the schematics. Detailed information on repairs were also provided and Naruto pursed his lips, silently observing, as his computer friend tentatively skimmed through the illustrations and instructions.

Previously, Naruto kept this from the computers scrutiny to spare Ai's processing power and speed from being overloaded with information. Locked away until Naruto called for them, providing Ai with brief security clearance into the vault where he kept the drawing, Ai had never had express freedom into its beloved master's outstanding illustrations. Now that the computer was sufficiently evolved, the young inventor thought it ready to take up more responsibilities. The idea was for the broken robot, always controlled by either Naruto or Ai, to repair itself or for another robot to patch-up the damaged one.

"I'm sure you'll try your best."

"_I promise, boss. I won't let you down."_ Ai vowed with as much sincerity as a sentient computer deeply loyal to its master and creator. Which, quite frankly, was a lot of sincerity. Naruto was almost taken aback when the portion of Ai's brain set apart for its growing sentience and emotion flared, honest numbers flowed around in the hologram before Ai quickly screwed back control on its emotions. The only security clearance Naruto didn't give was making grave, altering decisions on its own without first informing Naruto, and for that Ai truly didn't mind.

"For the Auto-reactivation it's just to jump start any recently repaired tech."

"_Understood."_

The boys arms, spread wide to encompass as much of the holographic brain as possible, closed till the brain shrunk, small enough to be contain in his cupped hands. Naruto held the brain in his right hand and retyped on the screen of his goggles again. The brain fizzled out from his hand and entered the visors. The cleaning robots stopped shortly, beeping and bleeping, then moved about again.

"_Full system reboot is required to fully integrate System Update, boss. Approximately two hours."_

"Go ahead."

"_But-"_

Naruto waved his hand, going to a cleaning robot and pressing his thumb into the robots back. The robot stopped hovering and almost crashed into the ground if not for Naruto catching it, dropping it onto the ground and gently as he could. He grunted under the weight of the heavy robot. "I can finish packing. Your handling very, very delicate information, Ai, it won't be good if I lose them. Take your time."

"…_Yes, boss."_ Ai buzzed, preparing to shut down all of its system. The drones that had been flying for miles towards Kumo, somewhere on the opposite side of the continent, perched themselves on the ground among a thick group of trees. _"What will you be doing when you finish packing?"_

Naruto, after making sure the other four cleaning robots were on the ground, tapped his chin; he would have to make a shadow clone to stir the batter of Yomi ash and fresh water, because the robot there would also deactivate. The black mist from the large pot would be a problem so he would have to give the clone his half mask and a pair of clear white lab goggles. "I'll get to work building the rockets fuel tank and after that I'll read a book."

The inventor had previously purchased some novels and manga from Waterfall country, with the aim of reading them at a leisurely pace once he found solitude. The one he planned to read was supposedly about an old man and the sea. Ai buzzed and muttered. _"Can you…tell me about it when you finish?"_

"Sure, buddy."

**OOOOOOOOOOOOO**

There was a point to not using chakra.

Yes, chakra can be used in fuinjutsu to store an immense amount of load, and in ninjutsu and genjutsu to make combat both more entertaining and efficient. Though with all of this, chakra had a weak point once used.

It left a trace on the user and in the environment.

Naruto had discovered this once he studied deep into the intricacies of chakra, which was why he made a point to minimize how much he used chakra.

Now, more than ever, he was glad he was using his tech in place of chakra but also now more than ever he was glad to know how to use chakra because, you see, using a storage seal-obviously powered by chakra-was the easiest, most portable way to store a dead body, not to talk of two dead bodies. A controlled, tightly contained Henge was also best when one wanted to hide their identity, leaving only a miniscule amount of their presence in the process.

A six foot tall man in a black cloak, which had a high collar that covered his chin and went down to just above his ankles, where a pair of midnight black with red soled combat boots decked his feet. The man looked to be of slim build from casual observation but when they looked better they saw he had broad shoulders, a straight posture and hard, merciless crimson red eyes; a character trait for a shinobi that was confident in their abilities. His lower face was hidden behind a mask that had a gruesome painting of a pearly white, serrated grinning maw of some beast. His hair was grey, with streaks of yellow here and there, but it did nothing to reduce the intimidation factor of the cloaked man stomping down the dusty, sandy road of Hokori town of Western Wind country; the small hamlet-like town lived up to its name, with the dusty road and the few set of houses he saw were made from burnt clay and red bricks with aluminium roofs, meant to withstand the harsh and hot winds as well as the heat of the desert.

There really wasn't much to the town, the people walked about with brown turbans, heads lowered and going about their business, too distracted by the heat to give a damn about why one of such terrifying visage was walking in their quiet town.

This mysterious man walked round the corner of a building into an alley and stopped just before a burly man in a tight white shirt and brown turban, standing before a trap door in the ground with his strong, barrel-like arms crossed and his frown deep. His displeasure deepened at the appearance of the cloaked figure, and he opened his arms, ready to strike down the obvious ninja but stopped short when the front of the cloak opened and the newcomers hand slid out. A long sleeved brown camo shirt covered the man's arm and were tucked into a pitch black glove with a red palm, the same style as the man's boots. In his palm was a recognizable brown eye.

The bouncer sniffed from deep within his turban and hummed, feeling the residual chakra of the one that once owned those eyes.

"What business do you have here, shinobi?" the bodyguard asked, his deep voice rumbling but not attracting any attention from the people bustling outside the short alley.

"I want to trade." The man answered easily, his voice was smooth.

The bouncer's eyes narrowed. "How did you find out about this place, shinobi?"

"The Dealer recommended I come here."

The man's eyes narrowed, then he stepped aside and opened the trapdoor. "Then he must be expecting you. Enter."

Naruto ducked into the trapdoor, stiffening when the door slammed shut before he proceeded down the subterranean path. The Dealer was the owner of the Underground Market, Sunagakure's most notorious black market. The boy stepped into a small room at the end of the path; the walls were painted a soothing blue and white and the ground had red carpeting. A single ceiling fan spun weakly above his head. In that small room was an extremely tanned, brown haired, fat nosed, potbellied man in a silk kimono sitting behind a desk and clacking his fingers on a typewriter. He grunted deeply and groaned, then his eyes lifted from his work and met Naruto's. His right hand reached under his desk and pulled out a girl years' older than Naruto and shoved her aside towards yet another trapdoor.

"Go back and tell you madam your services were less than satisfactory." He stated with finality, not bothering to look at the horror struck girl. The girl wiped her mouth and implored.

"Sir, I-"

"I have business to attend to. Leave."

The girl stopped and her fist clenched. She cast a hateful glare at the grey-blonde and spat at him with as much disdain a winded girl could muster, which wasn't much. There goes her supper. Naruto looked at her with bored eyes and she grumbled, opening the trapdoor and descending down into the massive underground market. The small room was quiet. The man adjusted his kimono and stood up, his arms open, welcoming.

"Yoshimaru, I'm glad you found the time to visit me."

"Not a visit, I come to trade."

The man's eyebrows lowered, almost as if he was disappointed. Naruto knew better; this greedy bastard knew he _wouldn't_ be there for anything other than business because kami knows how much Naruto disliked the Suna black market's chief secretary but the man paid well. "Well…that is a shame." He motioned to the chair but Naruto, now named 'Yoshimaru', shook his head.

"I'm sort of in a rush." He brought out a scroll from his pocket and threw it to the fat trader. The man unrolled the scroll and his eyes widened joyously at what he read. His jowls practically quivered with happiness.

"I knew I was right to hire you. Yoshimaru _always_ delivers, ha!"

A week before, Naruto's name as a bounty hunter-Yoshimaru-was on the lips of every one of the trade and Naruto would admit that it was what most likely led to him being discovered by Tsume. His reputation was wild mostly in Waterfall country, as he had been known to capture A ranks, whether dead or alive, with a success rate of nearly a hundred percent. People had come forward with offers for him to capture bounties and sell it to them at a five percent discount but Naruto didn't see the point in this as the Bounty Stations paid in full each and every time he brought in a new bounty. The fat black market trader was among those that approached Yoshimaru with a mission and Naruto had initially declined but the persistent man gave the disguised boy his card if he ever changed his mind.

Previously, the plan _was_ to have Sasori and Diedara's bodies taken to Bounty Stations somewhere in Wind country so that he could offload the sealed up corpses _and_ make some money along the way but the Bounty Stations in the country were on high alert for anyone with the S ranks dead bodies, and Naruto suspected the whole continent too were on high alert. He had overheard so from some men in a station west of Wind country's capital. Naruto desperately wanted to get rid of the fuinjutsu sealed bodies, as the seal itself felt was a tracking beacon to anyone that recognized his chakra.

That left him the option of selling it to the Fat Trader, as he so conveniently called himself, but at a discounted price.

This was appropriate in itself because Sasori of the Red Sands and The Mad Bomber, Deidera, were the two targets the Fat Trader wanted him to take out and sell to him.

The man's greedy brown eyes shone with the light of a million stars, his fat fingers held the scroll in twitching hands. "You've just made yourself a fortune, young man!" his eyes searched Yoshimaru's cloaked figure. "Where did you seal the bodies?"

"The money first, then I'll hand you their bodies."

The man chortled. "Don't trust me, I see. Good. Never trust anyone in the black market, I always say." He went to his desk and took out a scroll of his own, handed it to the bounty hunter with both hands and a polite bow. "Five percent per head, as agreed upon."

Yoshimaru-Naruto didn't like the deal, not one bit; a bounty of up to seven million for Sasori and ten million for Diedara, both from their respective villages, broken down to three hundred and fifty thousand (350, 000) for Sasori and five hundred thousand (500, 000). It was either handing over the bodies as soon as possible so that he didn't have any chakra beacon on his person or waiting until a better deal came, and Naruto very much to get them off his hands. The man closed his eyes pleasurably and Naruto swept past him to his desk, placing the scroll on top and unsealing the stacks of cash and riffling through them to make sure they were all real and accounted for.

"As you can see, I am as good as my word, Yoshimaru." His gluttonous eyes watched the ninja count the money. "I even went out of the way of sending out all of my guards to better put you at ease."

"Seems so, Fat man." Naruto grunted, keeping his cool. He passed another scroll to the man. The man unsealed the bodies and his elated expression melted, much to Naruto's own pleasure.

"What is the meaning of this?" the Fat Trader asked darkly, standing up from the ground with an angry red face. On the floor lay Diedara and Sasori-or what remained of them-and all they had on were white loincloths. "Where are their weapons? Their world class, _signature_ weapons?!"

"The deal was to bring them to you, dead or alive, and not to bring with them their 'signature' weapons." In this case being Sasori's puppets and his-crushed-heart and in Deidera's case his explosive clay.

"Outrageous! Without those weapons they might as well have no value! What man would believe it to be them if not for their S ranked weapons! Even a deaf man would not pull this stunt! I can have you killed-"

"Hey," Yoshimaru barked, glaring at the angry fat man. "Calm the fuck down. If you want the rest, then you give me the rest of my bounty." And as an afterthought, he added in a tone that was saturated in dark humour. "You really shouldn't have sent out your guards. Never trust anyone in the black market."

"Well I never…!"

Five minutes later, Naruto walked out of the trapdoor, the complete bounties comfortably in sealed his pockets. He stood at the front of the alley for a moment, quickly taking out ten thousand ryu and stashing it into his wallet and slid the storage scroll containing the rest of his bounty into a disk shaped contraption that was six inches in diameter. It looked like two very flat cones welded together at their bases, the edges alternating from blinking red to green. His red soled gloves skimmed the edge and the blinking light changed to blue. He pulled his back and threw the disk into the air, like a Frisbee, and the contraption rocketed into the air, disappearing into the clouds in a gust of air.

The bouncer behind him raised his eyebrows, intrigued at the small display, idly wondering why he didn't sense any chakra being used.

His mouth dropped when the cloaked figure bent down slightly and, in an explosion of scorching hot air, shot into the sky in a blur of outstanding, mind boggling speed.

"What…the…"

**Authors note**

**What adventures lay in wait for Naruto in Kumo? You'll just have to wait and see.**

**For those that were expecting Minato to feature in this chapter or for Kushina to die, then you'll have to be a bit patient. They'll have to show up…eventually.**

**I'm aware I haven't done this in a while but I just felt like doing it.**

**Next time on Redlights**

"_Destabilizer!" Naruto roared, his voice cracking as he bent backwards under a roundhouse kick, swept his leg to trip his opponent but had to flip backwards onto his hands when the lady reared her leg back to step on his former attack. He flicked his left foot forward, still standing on his hands, and used the red sole to block a tanto strike._

_Ai, reluctant, answered. "Target cannot be identified."_

_Naruto hissed as sparks exploded from his foot meeting the tanto and his hands fell out from under him after the woman sent her own leg sweep but the tech genius went into a roll, giving himself some distance. "What do you mean you cant identify her? She's right there-"_

_He stopped, finally fully observing the woman with his goggles, and cursed._

_No chakra core._

_No brain activity._

_No body heat._

_No pulse._

_It was like he was being attacked by a faceless corpse._

_Naruto knew better._

_Despite the hunter ninja mask adorning her face, a scary depiction of the Shinigami's face, saw-toothed mouth and gaping, wide, soulless eyes that flashed with the red glow of the Kunoichi's Mangekyo sharingan, Naruto knew exactly who he was fighting._

_Mikoto twirled her tanto in her right hand and stared at her target with an impassive gaze, angling her head to the side when the boy lowered himself into a crouch, placing his bare right hand on the ground and his left tapping the ankle of his left boot. Orochimara, not wearing a mask, emerged from the ground to the Uchiha's side and licked her black painted lips._

_Memories flashed behind his eyes, of a wild Uchiha screaming into completion alongside a red haired Uzumaki. Both smiled motherly at him, softness radiating in their eyes, in spite of the tormented gaze that returned to them. Ai shocked him back into reality._

_Naruto bared his teeth and snarled._

**Hope you liked this chapter.**

**Drop a review on your thoughts, would you so kindly. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	10. Chapter 10

**Ssssssup**

**Shout out to anthonym3 (part of his ultimate plan. Thanks for the review!), PinkiePieParty122894 (Same!), saiyan prince1 (I wont put it past him), Bravegoodsir, lord7th (thanks, dude!), El Professor (thank you very much. Words cannot begin to describe how much I'm happy your enjoying the story.), TheKing91, OverseerOfHimself (that **_**is**_** a good idea. Thanks!), Spark681, Dawood Saqlain (thank you). You guys are amazing, made my day :)**

**Chapter ten is here! Finally huh.**

**Thank you to those that patiently stayed with this story thus far. I know my update schedule isn't…the best but I work with what I have. I cannot even begin to say how much I'm thankful this story is getting some reads. I appreciate the living daylights out of all of you! I'm also grateful for the feedback, your thoughts and opinions, all of you. It helps me write more chapters. I'm having a lot of fun writing this story and its great motivation to know you guys, my dear readers, enjoy it.**

**This chapter is going to have a somewhat fast paced fight.**

**So with those words, enjoy…**

CHAPTER 10

Kumo's border security was much stricter than Lightning country's own. A lot stricter.

One cannot even begin to describe how incredibly hard it was to infiltrate Kumogakure no Sato, meanwhile Lightning country could simply be waltzed into and the border patrol wouldn't bat an eye or put up much of a fuss.

This was so because Kumo was _the_ richest hidden village on the continent, an undoubted, undisputed statement that dated as far back as the villages founding. This could be seen in the gleaming infrastructures that towered around the city-like village, the good, stable standard of living for the people and the abundance of missions from both the village itself and people from other countries. Another reason for the village's high border security was because Kumogakure no Sato was the second most technologically developed settlement on the globe, only coming after Snow country and contesting for a firm second place against Hidden Darkness, an almost equally developed village.

There were electric trains zipping around the village and the average Kumo citizen aspired to become an engineer before even considering being a shinobi, although the number of ninjas weren't by any stretch of the imagination low, they weren't as many as more populous villages like Iwagakure.

The process to acquire permission into the mountainous, technical village was very, very, _very_ difficult and the screening process was gruelling. There was a slight exception in the screening process for people coming into the village that exempted them from being too deeply looked into, and this exception was if the entrant was had a Permanent Travelling Permission Card (PTP) from either Snow country or Hidden Darkness. A PTP card could also be gotten from Kumo to any of the other two villages but acquiring it was difficult.

A PTP card was a passport that exclusively gave the bearer express-though ever so _slightly_ limited-permission into and around the Three Tech Nations that an average passport would not allow without intense questioning. The special card was keyed to the bearers so that thieves won't be able to use it and it had a flat chip inside that contained every single bit of information about the bearer, from distant family to education.

Naruto had initially thought of going to Hidden Darkness instead of Kumogakure, seeing as the former was much closer to Demon county and hence closer to his satellite's battery, the charger and the lightning conductors and his Cliffside base-a base so convenient that Naruto refused to fully part with it-but, once he inspected the border security during the months he was a fulltime bounty hunter in Waterfall he threw away any hope of infiltrating using any conventional means because Darkness had more shinobi patrolling the borders, despite the small size of the country and even PTP card holders had to go through intense questioning. He went and inspected Kumo and the situation there was slightly-slightly-better though not different. Last he went to Snow and that itself was worse than both because the paranoid daimyo of the country had set in place dozens of means to catch infiltrators, so much so that even someone of Naruto's upbringing would find it hard.

Kumo was his best option amid a small group of amazingly similar alternatives.

Chakra sensors.

Face scans.

Fingerprint verification.

Background checks.

Dozens of ninja squads ever ready to take down anyone that _looked_ suspicious.

Naruto sighed and ran his hand through his dyed dull blonde hair…He made a mental note to revert back to grey-blonde when he was done with Kumo.

Oh and to appreciate how computer savvy he was.

The boy took his seat in a large, spacious waiting room with eggshell white walls and dark brown carpeting. An air conditioner kept the room cool, in spite of the sweltering heat of the northern continents weather. The room smelt thinly of calming incense. In the waiting room were five other people who had come before him; an old couple, a young couple and a single boy in casual attire. His quick eyes instinctively scanned the room for exits, windows, any crack he could capitalize in his escape if shit hit the fan. He took into account that the walls might be seal reinforced and the shinobi were trained to storm into the room at a moment's notice. At the moment, people coming into the village for that day were few, which was good, meaning that security wasn't on that much high alert and there was relative quietness in the waiting room, except for the _irritating_ buzzing of the young couple.

Naruto shot a dark look at them, something they didn't see, and cracked his neck.

He wasn't scared.

Far from it really.

He was the calmest he had been since leaving Demon country.

Naruto was in his _element_.

The runaway was in a dark brown T-shirt-easily mistaken for black-and black pants that reached over his ankles with black sneakers on his feet. Over his shirt he wore an unzipped dark red coat that had a hoodie flopped back, on both arms of his hoodie there were three white racing stripes going down from his shoulders to his wrists. In his pants left pocket was exactly seven thousand, two hundred ryu and in his other pocket was a pack of blueberry bubble gum, something the boy wasn't too much of fan of but it was good for nerves. He wasn't chewing one now though. His black goggles dangled from his neck and his average sized duffle bag of clothes sat on the chair to his immediate right. Inside, the bag was split into half; on one side were his clothes and his shoes, some scrolls and books, while on the other side were his weapons. A sheathed katana lying on both halves, his combat gloves and boots, ten _tiny_ drone bombs, a set of explosive, homing kunai and shuriken, his half mask, two electric whips, four especially small-more compacted than normal-combat drones; Alpha Lightning, Beta Water, Gamma Fire and Alpha Wind, three tech pads, a roll of ninja wire, five inch nails, about fifty poison tipped senbon and lastly were stacks upon stacks of ryu.

Naruto did the math in his head. He should have about eight hundred, thousand ryu inside.

More than enough for what he wanted to buy in Kumo.

"Next!" the old couple slowly got up, their bones creaking, and staggered into another room on the opposite side of the entrance. Naruto sniffed and brought out one tech pad.

'_Time to get started.'_

He patiently waited for the tablet to turn on. The screen lit up with white light then the words _Techno-Shinobi_ pulsed onto the screen, and Naruto tried not to smirk; he had assembled those tablets not too long ago and he was going back and forth with himself on making the words techno-shinobi his calling card. He was thinking of adding a grinning beast to the start-up screen. He shook that thought out of his head when the words disappeared and a background of the Demon country Cliffside came up. He went to work.

With the pad on his lap, his fingers flowed on the screen, typing. The surveillance cameras in the waiting room fizzled for a split second and the ninjas in the security room blinked briefly in confusion, looking intently at the feed coming from the cameras.

Nothing was amiss.

Four people in the waiting room and all were, as expected, waiting.

The fake video feed in place, Naruto vibrated with a laugh. Naruto removed a single ear bud from the top right part of the tablet and muttered in a low voice he was positive was going to be drowned by the low hum of the air conditioner and the nauseating muttering of the young couple. "Ai, bring out the X-ray." A detailed x-ray of his duffle bag rolled out and he took his time covering up his weapons.. He moved that aside and said. "My info."

"Next!" the young couple left.

As commanded, his information popped before him but not _his_ information. Naruto memorized the alteration, and his newly created alias, and swiped that aside too.

"I'm going to break into their exclusive security computer network, Ai. Do not touch _anything_, ok?" he said firmly and the super computer huffed mutely.

"_Yes, sir. But sir, I don't know why you're bothering; I can do this."_

Naruto rolled his eyes. "If I intended to destroy their network, I would have let you loose." He could sense Ai's discontent and he paused, just cracking his way into the super encrypted computer network. Any other person would have been discovered the very moment they merely grazed the firewall. "The only methods of hacking you know are crude; smash and grab, shatter and disorganize, burn and destroy, invade and decimate, whatever. I know this because I'm the one that _built_ you. For now I'm going for the stealth approach. Watch and learn." He tapped once more and the whole Kumogakure computer lay before him, bare and unprotected, like a map, and no one was the wiser.

Ai sniffed inaudibly. _"…Fine…sir."_

Naruto cracked a tiny grin. "Cheer up, buddy." He went about inputting his alias information into the system as he spoke. "At this point I don't expect you to be wildly competent in subtle electronic infiltration. You're still learning." Ai was still down and Naruto knew this, so he gave a bright, close eyed smile. "And besides, I've got something extra important for you to do now."

"Next!" the single man left.

The sentient super computers interest piqued. _"What do you want me to do, boss?"_

Naruto closed the firewall but left a gaping hole in it for him alone to exploit. "I want you to slide in the altered x-ray into the system when the time comes. Can I trust you to do that?" It wasn't going to be hard.

The boy's computer companion answered straightaway. _"Yes, boss, you can trust me."_

"Cool." He said and placed the still active tablet into his back and then brought out a fresh, new, gleaming PTP card. Blood keyed, verified and everything. In a gambling ring back in Konoha, he was able to get a glance at a real PTP card from an inebriated drug lord that was visiting the village from Hidden Darkness, scanning it right down to its computer chip. The man was drooling on the bar of the Blooming Sakura, waving it around as if it was a trophy of some sort. He ended up falling asleep and Naruto had Ai scan the card right down to its base codes. Building a printer, inputting his alias information and making a perfect PTP replica was almost child's play for the young inventor; he did this in Demon country, _before_ he went and met the daimyo. The card couldn't be faulted, not with the boys detail oriented mind.

Two new people entered the waiting room and took their seats near Naruto. The boy, in the process of bringing out his new PTP card and storing it in his pocket also retrieved a pair of rectangular glasses. Non-medicated, of course. He whipped it on and smiled politely to the excitedly chattering girls next to him. Civilians, from what he could guess, and they were coming back from their vacation in Hidden Tea, from what he could gather from their near indecipherable babbling.

"Next!"

He rose onto his feet and hefted up his duffle bag onto his shoulder, smoothly ambling his way into the adjacent room.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The Security Officer was bored; Naruto could see that, as he walked through a metal detector, placing his bag on a conveyor belt that sluggishly moved into an x-ray machine. Predictably, the machine didn't catch anything metal on his person or in his bag and he picked it up on the other side of the x-ray machine, faking a grunt as he lifted it to his shoulder.

The blonde boy moved with stiff legs towards the desk of the officer and the man's bored black eyes looked up from his computer, content that there wasn't anything threatening in the blonde boy's bag or on his person.

So he didn't bother searching him personally.

He yawned into his fist and asked. "Passport, please."

The boy provided a PTP card and the sleep in the man's eyes cleared up right away. He flagged the boy into a seat, as was protocol whether or not the person planning to enter Kumo had a PTP card or not, and the boy dropped his bag with a huff, sighing into the offered seat on the other side of the desk. The man examined the card and nodded slightly before he slid the computer card into a slot on his computer. The blonde's passport photograph and details came up not too long after. The man compared the image on his screen to the real person and nodded again, satisfied.

"Your name is…?" he asked, more out of courtesy.

"Sou Azayaka."

"Full name, please."

"Sou Osoroshi Azayaka. Call me Sou."

The man raised an eyebrow at that. "Is Azayaka your family name?"

"Yes." The boy confirmed with a nod.

'_Grim Soul Bright huh…'_ the man smirked. He then admitted. "You have a cool name."

The boy visibly brightened, like his surname. "Thank you."

"What is the purpose of your visit?"

"I want to spend the coming winter in Kumo. I heard that the Festival of the Winter Moon is spectacular, so I wanted to see it form myself." The festival was going to take place within next week and it was going to be fun and fanfare all round for people of Kumo and foreigners allowed inside. It was because of the festival that there was an unusual dip in security officials in the Snow-Darkness Returnee building and more on the Carriage gates, where carriages, carts and people not from Snow or Darkness entered from, in mass waves, so as to enjoy the upcoming festival. On a usual day, at least three officers would screen entrants, now it was only one.

"Do you plan on working during your stay?"

"No."

The officer checked the info on his screen, which also had the amount in the boy's bank account information, and asked, merely to double check. "Are you sure?"

"I have enough saved on me."

"If you're sure…" he scrolled down, saying. "How old are you?"

"Sixteen."

"And your parents trust you to travel alone?"

"I live with my grandparents and yes, they do; the distance between Snow country and Kumo isn't too much."

"Do you have any family in Kumo?"

"No. I'm an only child and I don't have any cousins."

"Where will you be staying within the duration of your visit?"

"In a hotel."

"How will you be able to afford a room in the hotel? For what I know, a good hotel in Kumo costs no less than thirty thousand ryu per night."

"I have enough saved up."

"How much money do you have on your person?" Not the one in his supposed account, Naruto guessed.

"Four hundred, thousand ryu."

"Ah," it finally made sense to the officer. He checked the x-ray image of the bag and saw the money. "Makes sense now…"

"Sorry?"

"You're cleared to enter; I just need your fingerprint." He took out the card from the slot and slid it to Naruto, who pressed his thumb onto the surface. The computer beeped and the man nodded, again. "Alright, you're cleared to enter. Enjoy your stay in Kumo."

"I will. Thank you." Naruto got up and picked up his bag.

The security officer's tired mind turned; he had been sitting down for _hours_. The bespectacled boy was about to pass him, until he finally-_finally_-took note of the sixteen year olds blaring red eyes. "Wait." Naruto paused on his walk past the officer to the door to the older man's left, which led right past the gates of the village-at the moment they were a cluster fuck of noise and activity-and into Kumo proper. The man stared at Naruto, recalling another face. "Has anyone ever told you, you look…familiar."

Sou seemed to get frustrated, and he made it known with a semi-annoyed sigh. "Like that Uzumaki brat that ran away from Leaf, right?"

The man's forehead crinkled, his fingers slowly slipping under his desk to activate an alarm seal. The boy noticed this motion and rolled his eyes. "Yeah…exactly."

"I get that a lot." The officer's hand stopped. "It didn't matter a few months ago and now that he's hot shit I get hassled everywhere I go."

"You're…not him? Uzumaki Naruto?"

"Last I checked I wasn't _Uzumaki_ Naruto." Sou said, like it was obvious. "And even if I was, why do I have a PTP card and why haven't the computers alerted you already? Kumo's network is among the best on the continent; it'll take an act of kami to trick it."

The man slowly smiled and withdrew his hand from the alarm seal. "Yeah, you're right. What was I thinking? Sorry about that. That brat is boiling this whole region. Lord Raikage is yelling himself hoarse just to catch that kid." he rubbed his forehead and exhaled. "Again, sorry for the disturbance-"

"Don't worry about it. It'll all blow over and life would return back to normal."

The man chuckled and leaned back in his chair. "I hope so."

"Have a nice day, officer."

"You too." As he exited the room to the final door into Kumo, he heard the officer yell, "Next!"

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_At that moment_

_Amekage's office_

_Amekage tower_

_Ameagakure no Sato_

Today was oddly calm.

Nagato stood, staring outside the wall-window of his office, over the dreary, damp world he had called his home since the day he was born. The sickly man's purple eyes glowed in the dim lighting of his office and his terse frown marred his already lightly wrinkled face, tired not from age but-for he had to be in his late forties, he couldn't really remember anymore-but from war.

Destruction.

Death.

His soul had lost since vacated his body and now he was a husk of what he used to be, a zombie to his ambition of one true world peace and unity. Yahiko death had been the last straw for him.

He didn't acknowledge the door of his office as it opened and Konan emerged from the darkness outside like a pale phantom, blank of emotion or care. Her light brown eyes looked to her childhood friend and stepped aside as Zetsu flowed into the office; the plant creature would have preferred to simply 'appear' in the room but under the threat of being crushed into oblivion he took the door.

The tired rinnegan holder had his hands to his back and did not turn when Zetsu bowed slightly; Konan flowed to another corner of the room. Her cloak rustled in her almost non-existent movement, her small purple pained lips remained straight, hidden behind her high collared Akatsuki robe, and her unseen hands stayed at her side. Nagato almost laughed at how well his friend was hiding her guard, he cracked a smirk when it went up at Obito's entry but didn't seem to take Itachi and Kakuzu as much of a threat.

Jiraiya had taught them all well.

His smirk reflected back to him on the window and it lessened.

Kakuzu slammed the door into Hidan's face and calmly clicked it locked in spite of the jashinist's murderous screams.

"Lord Pein."

Nagato grunted in answer, still not turning.

Zetsu continued. "**I have been able to track Naruto's last know**n position and I have been ab**le to gather evidence** on where he is most likel**y to be at this very mo**ment." The man didn't give any acknowledgement, so he went on. "He spe**nt a week **in Demo**n country; in an eastern Cliffside** hideout b**ut…even with my** best attempts…I ha**ve been unable to gain entry into the base. There are these…strang**e metal poles that dist**ort chakra in the air **an**d on**ce I try **to pass through my chakra would be, for lack of** a better phrase, turn**ed o**ff. It was very **painful**." The thunderstorm rolling through Demon country didn't make it any easier.

The man hummed lowly in thought.

"I'm cert**ain that is** his base." Zetsu continued. "**He went to the apartmen**t home of some Yakuza woman an**d the Daimyo's palace. I** can only suspect that he coerced the daimyo into s**ilence because no one has a**dmitted to seeing Uzumak**i Naruto in the country. I was then able **to follow him to Hokori town in Wi**nd country; he had some bu**siness **with **the Fat Trader. I was unab**le to follow him any further; I think** he caught my scent because he took** off into the sky**."

Kakuzu snorted but didn't interrupt; he found it hard to believe, no matter how many times Itachi, Zetsu and Tobi told him, that a kid could fly.

"**He somehow found his way past Kumo border security**."

That was a feat upon itself.

Zetsu didn't speak anymore, it was Itachi's turn.

"He is much stronger than I last saw him." Miraculously enough. "And last time I saw him he killed Sasori and Deidera, injured Tsume Inuzuka and forced Kuromaru to retire. If we launch a full scale attack on him in Kumo, not only will there be resistance from the village but we will all _die_ if Naruto has anything to say about it." The boy made it _awfully_ clear how he didn't mind wiping out their S rank organization if they stood in his way. "Our best bet is to tire him out before we go in for the kill. He will send his robots once he has sensed us but I'm sure we can dispatch of them quickly."

Collecting tailed beasts had been halted; killing the _brat_ that reduced their number by three was their priority, according to Tobi-Madara.

Naruto could no longer be seen as a potential partner.

He was a risk.

He was dangerous.

"I informed Orochimaru of Naruto's current location and he," or she, Itachi wasn't too sure anymore. "Is on his way to Kumo with…my mother, Mikoto Uchiha."

Mikoto the Red Hellspawn.

Death's Daughter.

Kushina Uzumaki's best friend.

Obito felt goosebumps run up his arm.

Kushina was the powerhouse Kunoichi and everyone feared her for it, while Mikoto was the more subtle in her fear inducing murder methods. She was a kind woman, to some she deemed her friends, but she was a walking nightmare to people she disliked.

Mikoto had gotten the moniker Red Hellspawn from those that witness her frenzied battle against an entire squadron of Kiri ninjas.

She was later called Death's Daughter when she had been found sitting on a mountain of corpses, drenched in blood and panting shallowly. The image of his mother sitting on dead bodies, clenching her tanto in her right hand and her sharingan whirring angrily in her sockets, was what scarred Itachi for life.

If Mikoto Uchiha alone couldn't capture Naruto, or at the very, _very_ least tire him out, then they should all have to re-evaluate Uzumaki Naruto again.

"Kakuzu, Hidan, Tobi and Itachi, follow them. Make sure he dies." They nodded. He hadn't turned. "Konan, you will be back up but I do not want you facing him while the others are." The female S rank nodded with a small shrug. They were about to make their way out, but stopped when Nagato spoke again. "And Itachi," he looked over his shoulder, his powerful rinnegan eyes pulsing with barely stifled wrath. "All of you…it would be better if you _**killed**_ yourselves instead of returning back here without that boys head. If you run…if you hide…I will find you…"

He turned back to the world outside.

"Leave."

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_The night before_

_With Kushina, Mikoto and Orochimaru_

_Konohagakure no Sato_

Orochimaru scratched her chin.

"It seems your chakra core is too large for even medicine to suppress." The red haired woman pouted, for once in her life disappointed that she was so strong, but the snake woman's attention turned to Mikoto. "You on the other hand…"

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_King Bolt Super Store_

_Kumogakure no Sato_

Naruto wasted no time.

His bespectacled eyes looked up and down the aisle, rolling a shopping trolley half full of items behind him. He skidded to a stop and backtracked a few steps, squinting his eyes at a coil of copper wire hanging from a stand. He tossed the wire into his cart and, after much mental debate, threw in three more wires. His black sneakers squeaked on the clean, tiled floor and the wheels of the trolley barely made a sound as it moved at the boys hurried speed. His lips screwed to the side as he stared at a small canister of gas, dropping one into his trolley and skirting his way around to the other aisle. He looked up at the sign hanging above the aisle, similar to other signs hanging over other aisles, and went in when the sign said the aisle contained torchlight batteries. He dumped a few packs into his trolley and went on, shuffling into an aisle further away from the entrance, and he let go of his trolley, which kept rolling behind him as he walked on with clipped steps, and he quickly clambered up a waiting ladder and brought down a box of light bulbs, keeping them in the trolley and hurrying down again. His trolley still following, gradually slowing down.

Aluminium foil, sticky tape, nails, screws, a hammer, a mallet, seven satellite dishes-top of the line-, a transistor radio, a large box of black clay and three large magnifying lenses. Naruto rummaged into his hoodie and removed a piece of paper, scanning the list for anything he missed. He muttered and rechecked his cart, ticking off the items one after the other.

A dark skinned girl in a bright yellow and white shirt and black pants approached him with a gracious smile. Naruto flicked his eyes up from his list at her greeting. "Hello!"

"Hi."

She fingered her name tag. "My name is Kasi, is there anything you need that you haven't found?"

"Uhm…" the boy mumbled, his frown apparent as he looked from his list to the trolley. "Yes, actually, do you have any engine lubricant and super glue?"

The girls smile brightened and she grabbed Naruto's wrist, not noticing his narrowed eyes, and dragged him down the aisle and into a different aisle. The boy managed to grab his trolley as she pulled him. "Yes, right here." She motioned to the glue and pointed further down the lane. "The oil's down there."

Naruto ripped his wrist from her grip and nodded. "Thanks." He picked out a fair number of glue and turned to drop them into his trolley, he flinched when he noticed the blonde girl was still standing there, aptly staring at him inquisitively, her eyes curiously. "Something wrong?"

She grinned and pointed at his trolley, stating. "You want to build a magnet."

He found a wry smirk slinking up his face. He dropped the glue and pushed his cart up the lane to the lubricant. The girl seemed affronted that he had ignored her.

"A big magnet." She said, hurrying up to him and leaning in to look at his face. "A _huge_ magnet."

"What's your point?"

She looked visibly impressed at how cool he was keeping himself at being found out. "Not even the Kumo TV station has this big of a magnet."

The boy grabbed the oil, picking two more, just in case, and threw them into his brimming trolley. "Still don't know what you're trying to say."

She huffed and went after him as he pushed his purchases towards the counter. "Why do you need a magnet this big? How and where are you going to build it that no one will find out? When do you think you'll finish?"

"I don't see how that's any of your business." he smiled widely at her and turned to face the cashier, who was going through his procurements, curiously eying Kasi and the fair skinned boy.

"I'm just saying, you look really young. Too young to want to build this kind of magnet."

"Looks can be deceiving." That could not be any more true; since he had stepped foot in Kumo, he had programmed the surveillance cameras to not record his movements, rendering him digitally invisible. "I'm sixteen by the way."

"Do you go to Kumo College?" she asked, almost eager. She was fifteen herself and he was just about taller than her, something that cemented his age in her mind. "I'm a freshman there."

"I'm from Snow, graduated last year."

If she could get any more excited she would explode. "Already? I thought you were a ninja." He definitely had that vibe about it.

"That'll be ninety six thousand ryu, sir." The cashier droned and Naruto looked through his hoodie for his wallet, pulling it out and taking out a card. Bank of Lightning. He gave the man at the register and lifted up the large leather bags his purchases were in and set them into his trolley. As he swiped the card, the boy waited.

"My dad runs a guesthouse close by. We serve breakfast, lunch and dinner and we charge more reasonably than any hotel. Service is excellent, I swear." Naruto looked at her, waiting for her to get to what she really wanted to say. She brought out a crinkled flier of the guesthouse from her pants pocket and gave it to him, scribbling her number on it with a blue ink pen. "Call me if you get lost." He reluctantly took the flier and folded it, pushing it into his hoodie. "I could use some pointers with my homework; I'd…like it a lot if you came by and helped." She bowed deeply after she finished. Ai whirred from the goggles around Naruto's neck. He pushed up his not-medicated glasses

"Sure, I don't mind. What's your homework on?"

She scratched the side of her nose and laughed uncertainly. "Magnets."

The smile returned and the girl felt her cheeks redden as amusement danced in his soul shredding red eyes. "From what you were saying I thought you were an expert."

Kasi laughed again, an awkward sound that made even the utterly bored cashier cringe into himself. "Hahaha, yeah, so funny."

'_Oof.'_

"I'll be there in the evening." He said, collecting his-fake-bank card and pocketing it. The girl beamed at him, still in place, and the boy lifted his right hand into a fist, holding it out to her. Last time she grabbed him, he just barely stopped himself from lopping her head off her shoulders. She realized what he wanted to do and she bumped his fist. His mind jumped over why a girl as young as her had a job and why she needed to have another job. He spun around and pushed the trolley out, where he would have to call a carriage to take it as far up to the Tengen mountain range, of northern Kumo, as possible. "Later."

"Later!" she made finger guns and clumsily, again, tried to play it cool as she shot him playfully. He didn't see it and she slapped her forehead for trying. She glared daggers at the sniggering cashier. "Shut the hell up, Takaida!"

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Outside the store, Naruto was in a predicament.

As soon as the see-through automatic doors slid shut behind him, his ears twitched when he heard a quiet sucking sound before him, about fifty metres ahead of him. The air twisted within itself and the boy eyed the vortex suspiciously, readying himself for the battle he knew was to come.

Suddenly, and without warning to the dozens of spectators going about their business on the street, Naruto pushed his cart forward and threw open his hoodie, a pair of metal gloves zoomed out and lifted the trolley up into the air.

"Hurry." He breathed out, as if to himself and leaned to the side when a shinobi sandaled foot seemingly appeared out of thin air from behind him. The gloves took off to the mountain range. The world moved sluggishly before the boys burning red eyes.

Snake.

He smelt snake.

He smelt Orochimaru.

He bent back under the overhead kick, falling into a crab and flipping back onto his feet, tumbling into a roll under a savage elbow from yet another person. This one he couldn't smell at all. He hopped back onto his feet and skipped backwards, narrowing his eyes at his two attackers. His glasses fell in the process of avoiding the last attacker.

The alarms in his head and from the village blared.

He saw the mad Sannin lick her lips perversely, slithering towards him with dark, evil intent eyes. The other was a Kunoichi in common ninja gear, no sign on her person of the village she was from, his eyes made to look up at her face but a pair of kunai slid out from his sleeves, crossing them before his chest when a lethally sharp tanto dove for the space between his ribs under his heart. His eyes widened at her deadly target, and when his ninja knives chipped down half way at her second hack at his heart. He slammed his right foot squarely into her abdomen and spun on his heel, swiping his foot around and cracking his heel into Orochimaru's face, probably shattering a cheek bone. The woman flopped onto the ground, as if she was boneless, and hissed possessively at Naruto, her mouth open with a gaping growl, showing her rows and rows of killer fangs.

Naruto threw the knives down at the woman when she made to rise back up again. They thunked into the ground by her head and he leaped back again, his arms crossed over his face as he ordered Ai.

"Boom."

_BOOOOOOM!_

The pressure of the explosion threw the street into disarray, shaking the ground to its very core and scattering earth about. The boy winced as the arms of his hoodie singed slightly and he landed on the ground with a hard thud, having to hit support himself with his hands. Kumo ninjas were coming down on them in waves and waves of jounin and chunin; he saw Orochimaru regurgitate himself from the burnt, charred husk that he used to be and the mysterious, faceless Kunoichi blazing towards him, her tanto flying behind her.

He saw her mask.

He spat out a curse.

"Ai, activate my boots." His plain black sneakers trembled. It elongated over his ankles and stopped, the soles rippled and changed to red. Then silver plates crackled up under his pants and stopped under his knees. White hot energy shortly buzzed madly under his feet and the boy took a stance, staring at the woman shooting towards him.

He brought his right foot down.

The world stopped.

Everyone within a mile radius felt their feet leave the ground, going up not more than a foot. The hunter too floated off the ground, mildly surprised at the display, and grunted-more out of amazement than anything else-when the boy, once again, planted a firm boot into her unprotected stomach. The sheer speed he used to cut the distance between them and the tremendous strength he used to crack into her abs was _somewhat_ rattling. Nothing hurt, actually, but she gave him points for trying. He was certainly better than he was in Konoha, that's for sure.

Her back smacked into the ground and that shook the earth again, sending unstable people onto the floor yet again.

"Destabilizer." He breathed out.

Nothing.

His eyes widened.

Mikoto grinned under her mask.

"Not gonna work, Naru-honey."

"Fuck."

"Language." She grabbed his ankle and twisted, bringing him down to the ground. She wrapped her legs around his torso, throwing her tanto away in the process, and both of her hands grabbed his left boot. She yanked and the boots stayed on his foot. "Come on baby, don't be stubb-gah!" electricity surged from the boots and in her distraction a fist cracked into the back of her head, casting her off Naruto. The boy scrambled to his feet, out of breath. He felt a chill run up his spine and shook his head, his eyes blurry at the surge of memories flooding into his head.

White energy blasted from under his feet and he hovered off the ground. He blinked multiple times, trying his best to deny the identity of the masked hunter ninja. He took off into the sky and Orochimaru, finally done observing, melted into the ground. Mikoto stopped writhing in agony and breathed out, mildly frustrated, and got up. She picked up her tanto and, as the Kumo ninjas were falling down on her, she disappeared in a _kamui_.

Kasi, and all those in the safety of the Super Store, gawked at the display of all three combatants.

"Who _is_ that guy…?"

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Naruto crash landed in Kumo's almost barren upper north region, which was the closest to the deserted Uzushio Island. There was a mountain range that separated the Cloud village from the sea and miles and miles of ankle height grass showed that the technologically advanced village was not totally affected by the electrical revolution. He panted with his hands on his knees and groaned when the smell of snake wafted past his nose.

The bright side was that he couldn't sense either of them.

His phobia tied in with their strength, and since he couldn't sense their chakra-their strength-then he wasn't in too much of a risk of crumbling into a mess of hysteria. He snapped on his goggles and looked around, searching for any sign of the Sannin.

"Destabilizer!" Naruto roared, his voice cracking as he bent backwards under a roundhouse kick, swept his leg to trip his opponent but had to flip backwards onto his hands when the lady reared her leg back to step on his former attack. He flicked his left foot forward, still standing on his hands, and used the red sole to block a tanto strike.

Ai, reluctant, answered. "Target cannot be identified."

Naruto hissed as sparks exploded from his foot meeting the tanto and his hands fell out from under him after the woman sent her own leg sweep but the tech genius went into a roll, giving himself some distance. "What do you mean you cant identify her? She's right there-"

He stopped, finally fully observing the woman with his goggles, and cursed.

No chakra core.

No brain activity.

No body heat.

No pulse.

It was like he was being attacked by a faceless corpse.

Naruto knew better.

Despite the hunter ninja mask adorning her face, a scary depiction of the Shinigami's face, saw-toothed mouth and gaping, wide, soulless eyes that flashed with the red glow of the Kunoichi's Mangekyo sharingan, Naruto knew exactly who he was fighting.

Mikoto twirled her tanto in her right hand and stared at her target with an impassive gaze, angling her head to the side when the boy lowered himself into a crouch, placing his bare right hand on the ground and his left tapping the ankle of his left boot. Orochimara, not wearing a mask, emerged from the ground to the Uchiha's side and licked her black painted lips.

Memories flashed behind his eyes, of a wild Uchiha screaming into completion alongside a red haired Uzumaki. Both smiled motherly at him, softness radiating in their eyes, in spite of the tormented gaze that returned to them. Ai shocked him back into reality.

Naruto bared his teeth and snarled.

"Give me any one of my gloves; I don't care if you've found a good hiding place."

"_Already ahead of you, boss."_ Naruto held up his fist, using the back of his hands to bat aside a punch to his head, shifting his head aside from a two fingered poke to his forehead and guarding his face from another blow with his forearms. Orochimaru teemed happily that her target was capable enough to block her attacks when she was going at jounin strength. He came at her with his right fist, straight and true, and she saw the feint as plain as day, diverting the right fist attack over her shoulder, ducking the follow up left elbow, flowing each attack with the ease of a trained warrior. What she didn't see was the heel kick to the small of her neck.

Dark blue fire blasted from his foot, scorching the woman, and the foot met with a wet _THUD_!

Orochimaru's face smashed into the grassy ground, her head burnt beyond recognition. Naruto stood over her face down, prone form. Mikoto ran to her temporary partner, blade at the ready.

She heard a loud whirring sound and Naruto's right computer glove rocketed to its master. Naruto closed his right fist and pulled back, gritting his teeth powerfully and he roared. The bellow travelled far and wide, and his right fist carved as if coming for a right hook, the glove fastened itself to his hand and glowed red, looking more like a comet shooting down to earth from space. His pointer and middle finger jutted out as he continued the path of fiery, burning destruction downward.

His fingers jammed into the back of Orochimaru's neck and sunk in.

He pulled back and hopped away, using his right forearm to block her tanto. "How was that?"

"_Vital nerve point successfully shut down. Well done, boss."_

Naruto was only half listening, focusing a majority of his attention on his so called biological mother. Orochimaru underestimating him, _**again**_, was going to be her death. He had taken a shot in the dark and forcefully recalled a lesson he had with Mikoto on the seven main tenketsu and how puncturing one would spell the end of all movement.

"_I have sensed six chakra…cores…"_ Ai trailed off when it noticed that Naruto wasn't paying much mind. He was angry. His hair stood up, like a wolf with its heckles raised in agitation, and his eyes were madly deranged, teeth clenched strongly and body incredibly tense. _"I will…summon your drones."_

"Shhh, I'm trying to focus." Naruto grumbled.

The taijutsu match started off slow, each fighter testing the limits of the other, and gradually picked up speed. Power levels rumbled through the air and each attack, block or counter came with a resulting shockwave of air.

Mikoto cracked her right fist across the insane boys face, followed up with her right elbow and keeping the now dazed boy upright with a left knee into his side. Her left fist bounced on his forehead and he grabbed it with his gloved right hand before she could pull back, grinning at her with a look of a demented, wild animal. He yanked her towards him and broke his forehead into hers, rocking her whole world with a ground shaking headbutt. Her mask broke and clattered to the ground, but she didn't notice much; Naruto, still gripping her hand, drilled two blows to her lower abdomen and dragged her over his body, whizzing a jarring uppercut to her chin and slamming her into the ground with a (judo) flip. Her legs instinctively sprang upwards; her ankles wrapped around his neck and subsequently flipped him onto the ground as well. He managed to get his feet under him after her toss and twisted around so that he stood over her again, _still holding her hand_, and his gloves flared with dark purple fire.

Fire exploded from his protected hand and before she knew it, her whole left arm had turned to ash right before her very eyes.

"_Fire Manipulation: Hellfire."_ Naruto muttered, out of breath. Blood streamed down from his nose and the left corner of his mouth. He blinked, feeling his adrenaline levels going down.

He didn't register Mikoto's screams, muffled between her tightly clamped teeth.

This was not how she envisioned fight.

How the hell did he get this strong?!

She blinked away the haze and her eyes bugged out when the red palmed glove shot down to her face, burning with purple fire. The grass sizzled on contact and Naruto panted tiredly when the woman left in a kamui, reappearing behind him. He whirled around and she grabbed his neck with her right hand-her only hand left-pushed past the agony of her missing arm, and pulled him close to her face.

Her sharingan morphed.

Evolved past the Mangekyo stage.

The purple fire flicked off and Naruto's gloved surged up, steaming with heat, and he too grabbed her neck, forcing her to look into his as she too made him look into her. She could feel the skin on her neck fester under the residual heat of his glove but her mind ignored the additional pain, fighting past the first one of losing her arm. Her temporary Sannin partner was worse off than her anyway.

Orochimaru might as well be dead.

She had only one arm and her reserves were halved, seeping out of her as she gradually lost her cool.

She couldn't return to Konoha without her target; Kushina would undoubtedly _**kill**_ her.

She exhaled the sharingan ability stubbornly.

"_Tsukoyomi."_

**Authors note**

**We all know normal sharingan illusions don't work, but what of an EMS sharingan illusion.**

**Would Naruto succumb to the genjutsu?**

**Is this the end of Naruto's bid for freedom?**

**You'll have to wait and see.**

**Again, thank you to those that stayed with me so far. Your feedback has been wonderful. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you :)**

**Foy.**


	11. Chapter 11

**Hey**

**Shout out to LordofTerror (uhehehee…), BigY1308, TheKing91, PinkiePieParty122894, saiyan prince1, Dancingrage, s.k.f.f.f, HitGamer22, Spark681, Dawood Saqlain, anthonym3, zerkses and GamerX568 (this be a ff, mah dude, I did that for the shock factor. Thanks for your thoughts!). You are all amazing people :)**

**As a continuation of the last chapter and with the Akatsuki spying on Naruto's fight with Orochimaru and Mikoto, this chapter contains a somewhat fast paced fight.**

**I'll also like to say, as a sort of reminder on a past chapter, that Naruto can control earth and water with sound waves while he can create his own wind, fire and lightning attacks. This is because he cannot create his own earth or water and they have to be physically present before he can use sound to manipulate them. It's as logical as his inventions and the whole Narutoverse can get. He also doesn't necessarily **_**need**_** to say the name of his attack before he uses it but…it's more fun that way. His attacks use almost no chakra, hence why it's so lethal and Naruto too has a fair amount of taijutsu and kenjutsu skill.**

**Warning: this chapter contains extreme violence, blood, gore and depictions of death. Reading to the end, the ****Next time**** contains rape. It might trigger and it might upset (the death and the rape), so I want you to read on your own discretion. Don't flame me because I **_**warned**_** you.**

**There would also be a scene in this chapter that is an homage to canon. Can you pick it out?**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 11

Ai saw it coming.

Ai _saw it coming_.

_Ai saw. It. Coming._

The so called 'Tsukoyomi' was such a strong jutsu-genjutsu from the super computers fast analysis-that not even the drug Naruto's birth mother had taken to blot out the totality of her existence was able to suppress it.

The power was immense, that much was true, and Ai didn't lie to itself that it had the power to effectively block out the illusion, especially since it was coming at its master with the strength and speed of a Snow country bullet train. Naruto saw it coming too, a split second after the computer, and he also knew that his computer didn't have the processing power to block the illusion the moment it hit and his red 'eternally activated sharingan' eyes were still untested oddities, so he didn't know if they could stand against the genjutsu.

Instead of fighting to close his eyes, he gripped the older ninja's neck harder, scolding her pale skin under the terrifyingly hot grip of his right glove, and narrowed his eyes, stubborn and daring. His blood painted teeth bared savagely and veins bulged at the corners of his eyes.

"_Deflection."_ Ai said, it's almost feminine voice was low and gravelly, pouring in eighty percent of its processing power into it. Naruto saw the chakra of the sharingan illusion flow out of Mikoto's eyes slowly, the world moving at such a sluggish pace that the woman too was amazed to see it happen, and the chakra travelled around the boy, bending and warbling in a full circle, orbiting like the moon around the earth. The combat drones that had been on their way to hold off the Akatsuki from Naruto's newest hideout-a cave close to the summit of one of the mountains-deactivated. The left computer glove that was just about to take off to Naruto fell onto the ground, dead. The super computer buzzed, knowing very well what would happen if it put more focus into diverting the strong sharingan illusion. _"Reflection."_

Mikoto's mouth fell open as the Tsukoyomi slammed back into her face, twice as fast and twice as hard.

Illusions weren't meant to physically harm.

The Uchiha was thrown back, her feet lifting off the ground and blood streaming out of her mouth and nose, and she bounced off the grassy ground. Her eyes reverted back to normal, rolled far into the back of her head, and her skin paled even more than usual. Thin black smoke wafted out from her mouth, nose, ears and her eyes, and her fingers and legs twitched every once in a while.

Naruto sighed with his eyes closed and his shoulders drooped, dead tired; he had used up too much of his energy in the initial attack and the previous fear that held him sapped most of what was left, long before he could use his rage and anger to fuel his fighting. He breathed out and smiled weakly. "Thanks buddy."

No response.

He opened his eyes and noticed that his goggles were blank of any activity; no spinning ball at the bottom left, no revolving map on the top right, no shinobi information scrolling to the left, no sensors pulsing to the right.

Nothing.

Naruto frowned. "Ai?"

No answer.

His fear began to mount. "Buddy?"

His eyes frantically looked around the goggles, searching for even the smallest sign of his friend.

"This isn't funny, Ai." He stated, his voices struggling not to shake. "Come on…don't do this to me." he felt the sting of tears in his eyes. He ignored the sound of five people emerging from swirls of air-shunshin-and surrounded him on all sides, standing at a safe fifty or so metres away from him. "Don't leave me alone, buddy."

With his friend, his only real friend, Naruto had the strength to take on the whole world.

His didn't realize he was freely crying. His vision blurred with the hot tears and a large lump blocked his throat, making him hiccup. He slowly, reluctantly, pushed up his goggles to his forehead and slumped onto his knees.

What a sight, Tobi thought with a small smirk; a thirteen year old boy with yet two more incapacitated S ranks lying before and behind him. Orochimaru on her face with her arms to his sides and her legs together, unconscious and unable to move because Naruto had blown out her main tenketsu, turning off her chakra. Mikoto lying spread eagle on her back, staring with unseeing eyes at what only she could see, also unconscious. Naruto's eyes looked at the ground, unseeing and uncaring that he was about to attacked again. He could smell the smoke from his goggles and correctly summarized that the wires and chips that gave Ai its life and sentience were burnt beyond fathomable hope. If by some miracle he escaped from there with his life and he found a way to repair his goggles, he couldn't be certain that Ai would return the way it was before, if at all.

They watched as he exhaled sharply and got his left foot under him, placing his hands on his knee and pushing himself to his feet with a quiet grunt. He rolled his shoulders and cracked his fists. He winced at three sharp pains from his right arm; he wheezed and clenched his eyes in pain; a dislocated shoulder, compound fractured ulna and a multiple fractured humerus. The only thing holding his arm together was his glove and the segmented silver plating. Shutting down Orochimaru's system with such power on his part had done this to him. He hacked and spat to his side, wincing again at the blood, steeling his eyes.

He looked right at Kakuzu, stood was far ahead of him and looking on with mildly entertained mint green eyes, and lifted his hands up.

He beckoned them to come.

"Well…come on then, let's get this over with."

He closed his fists and held them under his eyes, vaguely like a defensive kick boxing stance.

Itachi spoke before the bounty hunter could accept the invitation. "Naruto, think rationally. Your arm is broken, you don't have reinforcements and the chances of Kumo ninjas finding us are slim. I'm guessing your friend, Ai was it? Isn't answering you too, so no tech enhancements." It was…disconcerting to see his mother in such a sorry state after the Tsukoyomi had been rebounded but he pushed that from his mind. "Stand down and accept your fate. I _promise_…your death will be swift."

Naruto's shoulder vibrated and he cracked a small grin, a bloody little thing that sent precautionary warnings into Kakuzu, Itachi and Tobi's minds. "Shows what you know." He rubbed the back of his hand over his eyes, cleaning away the tears, and barked. His senses informed him of the female flying above him with angelic wings made out of paper. The woman looked down at him with a plain look, as emotionless as ever, even as he said in a discontent voice. "I'm getting bored. Are you five going to stand there all day or what? Come at me!"

"I've had enough of this bullshit Uzumaki fuck running his fuggly little asshole mouth!" Hidan roared and raced to Naruto, spinning his scythe over his head. He separated weapon and threw the tri-pronged scythe at the insolent pest, connected back to a portion of the staff by a chain. Naruto turned to Hidan, visibly unimpressed.

The inventor's chakra flared and flowed through his glove and boots.

_Secondary power source activated._

The boy whacked the scythe away, grabbing the chain and dragging the mad priest to him. The speed rattled the jashinist to the core as he flew headlong towards the boy.

"What the fuc-"

Naruto's palm bubbled with white light, far different than the one he used to fly, and he fired it once.

_Once._

Naruto stepped aside as the now headless-and bodiless-priest whizzed past him like a broken manikin. His feet touched onto the ground, running a few wobbly steps before he flopped forward, crumpling onto his knees and skidding on the ground. The only body parts he had-his legs-spasmed and Naruto cast only a narrow eyed glare over his shoulder at it.

He held up his right glove, palm up, and they noticeably became more cautious. _"Plasma Beam."_ He whispered and the ominous white mist floated on his palm, looking both liquid and gas. It frothed with controlled rage and the boy slowly turned a dark gaze to Itachi. Naruto's plasma beam attack was a combination of all the affinities in Naruto's chakra-water, fire and wind-and funnelling it through tight cords and wires, superheated at impossible temperatures and expelled from his gloves or his boots. The attack very well burnt at a molecular level. Hidan wasn't going to be getting up any time soon. Tobi face palmed and moaned tiredly.

_Of course._

For this one too, he couldn't sense the boy's chakra.

They were reduced from four to three, all because of Hidan's lack of patience and tact.

"Don't you _fucking_ underestimate me." Naruto growled, bending down into his fighting style and snorting from his nose like a bull, rearing to gore his target with his horns. They heard a sharp whistling sound and Kakuzu was the second to pelt towards Naruto, a blur of speed and chakra. Naruto leaped to the incoming man, caught his unsheathed katana, and a quick spurt of plasma carried him over a volley of fire the man had poured from his mouth, swiftly landing behind him and slashing at the man's turned back.

The green eyed bounty hunter erected a wall of earth, as any competent and experienced ninja would, and the now plasma coated samurai weapon cut through the raised barrier like a knife through butter. The boy hopped through the opening, clenching the knife with his right hand alone while his left carved through the air, cracking the man clean across his face. Naruto grumbled briefly when the ninja crumbled into plods of earth.

"Hi!" he swung his right foot at the person, his straight kick flying right through the speaker and the boy felt a short spurt of fear ripple through him.

'_Ghost?!'_ then his rational mind tore that idea into pieces, bringing his focus back to the intangible person. He wore an orange mask that swirled from the middle to the edges, and only the right eyehole held a spinning red sharingan in its socket. The man slid away from the leg after the boy brought his initial attacking foot down and pivoted on it with a roundhouse kick. He scampered away when a plasma beam screamed at him, throwing about light and temporarily blinding him. The disintegrating ray tore through the grassy earth after the happily skipping masked man and Naruto only stopped to slap away a poke to his neck from Itachi, sliding under another poke, this one for his throat, and avoiding a mad grab for his face.

"Tobi's name is Tobi," the masked man said, popping before Naruto and avoiding a rising knee to his chin by tilting his head back, skipping from a flat footed kick to his chest and a downward right elbow with a happy giggle. "Naruto has been a bad, bad boy and Lord Leader wants us to kill you." Naruto fired a bolt of plasma, shattering a column of fire coming right at him from Kakuzu's fire mask. The plasma hit and the mask fell onto the floor as ash. "Tobi wanted us to be friends though. Naruto would have been Tobi's bestest friend in the whole entire world!"

Naruto rolled backwards, feeling a small annoyed twitch on his forehead, and dug his right gloved fingers into the soil, muttering. _"Earth manipulation: Quick sand."_ Kakuzu, who had been bellowing in Naruto's direction, enraged by the loss of his mask, fell into the soupy earth suddenly. Naruto removed his hand, the ground hardening back again, and fire a blast of plasma at the trapped bounty hunter but grumbled again when all he got was another earth clone. Destabilizer would have been great right about now.

"Neat trick. What did you call it? Quick sand, right? Look what I can do." Tobi flashed through a set of handseals and called. _"Earth release: Grand Mudslide jutsu!"_ the earth rose high into the air like a twisted tidal wave and Naruto's eyes immediately searched for the snake woman and his so called birth mother.

"I'm not done with you two yet." He grit and his boots squealed with strained power and he plasma bolted to their lying forms, scooping them into his arms, Orochimaru on his left shoulder and Mikoto being pulled along by her long black hair in his right hand. He bit down his wail of pain as his battered right arm dragged the woman through the air, surfing on the tidal wave of thick mud. A shadow clone popped from his person, in mid-air and struggling to out fly the almost sentient mud waves, and he chucked the two women at the clone, turning back down as the clone flew away with the women in his arms on a less powered version of his boots. He prepared to blast a wide spread plasma beam at the apparent Uchiha pest but was rammed aside by an irate Kakuzu riding on top of his wind mask. The boy managed to stabilize himself, only to be smashed aside again by a watery mud arm rising from Tobi's jutsu.

He wobbled in the air, coughing out blood and holding his left rib.

'_Umph…broken rib. Damn it.'_ on instinct, his katana, bubbling with plasma energy, slashed downward and clipped the bounty hunters incoming fist, cleaving off half of his hand and Naruto followed this dismembering attack by driving his knee into the green eyed man's face, forcing him to the ground. The boy wildly swung his blade again at another mud arm and, on contact with the molecule disintegrating substance; the mud hardened and fell apart into dust. Naruto mumbled under his breath, still not used to Ai being absent, and pointed his sword at the pesky Uchiha. "Get him."

His sword zipped from his hand and blazed down from the sky in a glorious explosion of white light. It homed towards the giggling masked man and, predictably, it passed through him as he made himself intangible. The sword jammed into the ground, cutting through the earth and weaving its way back, the mad Uchiha hopped aside as the katana jumped and dipped after him in the earth like a swordfish.

Naruto whizzed around and opened his palm at a seemingly random direction.

He caught the bolt of purple lightning from the bounty hunter and diverted it down to Itachi, who had been standing on the earth and observing the aerial battle with narrowed sharingan. A red skeletal chest appeared around him but the boy saw something as the lightning jutsu clattered against the Susanno.

Itachi's eyes closed fractionally more.

The boy wanted to slap his head in frustration.

Itachi and Tobi were Uchiha!

'_Another reason I need Ai.'_ He thought. He waved his right before him and said. _"Wind and Fire Manipulation: False Phoenix King of the Sky."_

Hot air poured through his glove, mixing with even more swelteringly hot fire, and Naruto closed his fist, firing the white hot wind bird at the flying bounty hunting. The wind phoenix had burning red eyes and there were red outlines on its body, the last notable feature was the concentrated ball of molten air in its chest; a tiny tracking beacon Naruto had programmed to chase the nearest source of human chakra with murderous intent. With each beat of its wings, soaring with trails of red fire behind it, it grew bigger and bigger, larger and more sinister. Its red beak snapped at the man, and it _cawed_, enraged as Kakuzu made the mistake of shooting jets of water at the fire bird.

_KRRRAAAAWWWWWWWWW!_

What looked like a pillar of molten magma spiralled from its screaming beak and Kakuzu swore foully as he yelled for his wind mask to fly as fast as possible around the fire attack.

"Fuckin' brat!" Kakuzu yelled when he was forced to sacrifice his water mask, slowing it down while he made a hastier retreat. He felt his water mask perish under the unforgiving heat from the false phoenix king. He finally had enough space from the massive winged creature and he began persistently firing stronger and stronger water jutsu at it, avoiding the bird with the best of his abilities.

The aforementioned 'brat' was currently zooming down from the sky towards Itachi, his right palm blasting fireball after fire ball at the sturdy Susanno. The ribcage gave way as he crash landed onto the ground, his feet hitting the ground with enough force to shake the whole landscape and his right fist clenched, shortly digging into the ground to steady him as he sped into a dash for Itachi, who looked at him with barely sad sharingan eyes. The boy baseball slid on one knee from a grab at his neck, leaving behind a few small black pellets and leaping as far away as possible, plugging his ears.

Itachi's eyes widened at another non-chakra based attack.

His red Susanno spun around him again, pushing the pellets away. They popped loudly with blinding lights, muted by the Susanno and distance, and his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. He looked to Naruto…and saw his hidden smirk as he took off in a random direction.

"Itachi, watch out!" Obito wailed.

Diversion.

The plasma katana ripped out from the ground and impaled the Uchiha through his back, stabbing clean through his heart and the tip exited from the front. He hovered two feet off the ground in that pitiable position; chest thrust out, back bent and his face twisted in unbearable pain. The plasma on the sword burnt through his innards like a tornado of fire, melting his internals and running afoul his logical mind.

How?

_How?_

It was really all about Naruto capitalizing on his unpredictable arsenal of weapons and his unpredictable fighting style.

Itachi's eyes lowered, oddly sleepy and his limbs lost their strength. Inside his head, his mind batted for freedom, trying and failing to move his body, to tear out the damn sword in his back. His sharingan faded to black when the plasma of Naruto's sword finally burnt his chakra core.

He felt like a pig, strung up off the ground over a slow roasting flame.

The sword did not drop Itachi until it sensed no heartbeat, an absence of brainwaves and a gradual decline in body heat.

Another S rank, taken down by the runaway.

Naruto's boots carried him towards Tobi, who, with a war cry, ran at him as well. This time Naruto brought out a two fistful of shuriken and threw it at the masked man, curving upwards and blocking out his ears with his fingers.

"Not gonna work on me! _Amaterasu_!" black fire roared from his Mangekyo eye, melting the shuriken. His eyes worked on over time and warned him of the attack coming from behind him; he spun around and, with both of his hands, caught the four kunai homing for both sides of his chest. His eye spun madly and he made to turn intangible, until-

A high pitched sound fell down on him from above and the four kunai blew up in his hands.

_KUUUUUUUUUUWWWWWWWWWWWWWEEEEEEEEEEEEE!_

The sound was enough to bring the armless man down to his knees. Blood poured from his eyes and nose and his eyes throbbed in pain as well. He frantically spun them to teleport him away, to retreat, but they failed him. His felt his chakra flee from him and the door to his reserves slammed shut on him. It wasn't as specific as Naruto's _Chakra Destabilizer_, but the sound of his _Sonic Wail_ would have to do for now. Naruto's wail came from his glove; it was the general sound people's chakra reacted badly to, closing up and leaving them without it, basically stranded. The sound needed to be pre-charged up and used as soon as it was ready and the charging time was roughly ten minutes. The boy mercilessly turned up the sound as he descended down from the sky.

Tobi's ears popped.

His eye popped.

His rapidly beating banged in his ribcage before it too blew open.

He felt the sound stop and his chakra slowly return to him but he also felt a pair of hands grab his head from behind, one on his chin and the other on the top of his head.

"Stop-"

Naruto twisted.

_Crack!_

The boy let go of the S ranks head and watched with grim satisfaction as he slumped forward.

Dead.

He spat on the cooling corpse and looked up to the sky when he glove beeped once. The fiery phoenix was torn to shreds by sheets of paper and Kakuzu was on a warpath in his direction. He had lost all of his masks but his wind mask, his clothes were badly singed and he had a terrible burn across his face and along his chest and right arm. The arm was now stubby and charred. The boy flicked his left hand and removed a single kunai.

He clicked the end and smoke billowed from the computer enhanced blade, blocking him from sight. Kakuzu zoomed into the smoke, face contorted with wrath and searching inside for the brat that had cost him nearly all his hearts.

There was a faint hiss before him.

'_There!'_ he flipped through some hands seals. _"Wind release: Cutting Whirlwind technique!"_ he swiped his hands at the location of the sound-instead of using fans, like how the jutsu is usually used-and a volley of cutting wind blew from him. The smoke blew away at the cacophony of noise from the wind based attack. In the mad fray of wind and sound, he didn't hear a quiet whistling sound behind him.

Naruto grabbed the back of his head with his gloved right hand.

_Ptew!_

The plasma laser opened up the back of the S ranked bounty hunters head and escaped through the front, effectively killing him. The blade threads in the wind mask flailed insanely and dropped down, falling apart. Naruto released what was left of Kakuzu's head and landed with a thump. He looked around at the carnage and counted three dead S ranks, plus two unconscious ones in his mountain hideout. He looked around for the woman and the last chakra source that _always_ hid from him.

He crossed his arms to protect his face and neck, and his gloves glowed light brown. The muddy ground rose up and hardened quickly, blocking a volley of paper-

_B-B-B-Boooooom!_

Naruto gnashed his teeth in agony as the explosion blasted him off his feet. He grunted each time his back skipped on the grassy ground, then he managed to right himself and stabilize his feet in the ground with a short pulse of plasma from his boots. His arms shot up at the tidal wave of explosive tags coming for him. His boots lifted him off the ground and flew him backwards as he fire off bolt after bolt of plasma energy at the female Akatsuki member he was to fight, having to hold up his messed up right arm with his left and fight through the pain. He could probably add a broken left radius to his list of damaged limbs.

His red eyes searched for a plan on how to deal with a woman that apparently had the ability to control explosive tags.

He tapped the back of his palm with his left pointer finger and faced the coming wave of explosions. _"Photon Beam: Light Refraction."_

This beam of light was different from the bubbling, misty white light of Naruto's plasma beam and the flickering, intentionally unstable white of Naruto's energy beam. It was strong and it was stable; it beamed to the wave and bounced from seal tag to seal tag, leaving behind what looked like a thin string of light until the whole complex of paper was connected. Naruto closed his fist and the paper obeyed, coming together in a surge of whiteness and forming a giant ball of bombs. He dragged his hand back, cutting the string and the chakra in the seal tags seeped out into the ground.

Naruto's photon beam was a greatly toned down plasma beam that is almost like a beam of normal light. In this case, he used a gadget in his glove that expelled elastic glue with each thing it touched and programmed the device to bounce off each source of chakra it found until it sensed nothing else to bounce off from. The photon beam moved at the speed of light, like the plasma beam, so its own function was to take the device to the wall of paper quickly. Deactivating chakra in an object, or objects, was simpler than doing so to living things; Naruto didn't use sound but extremely low _vibration_ from his glove, connected by the photon beam and the strings to expel chakra from the tags.

He exhaled in relief as the dead bombs scattered into the wind, forever unable to be used ever again, and stiffed at the voice behind him. "Impressive…but I have many more explosive tags."

He turned around in the air and beheld the Angel of Ame, hovering in the air also on wings of paper. She looked down at him with contempt. He cursed under his breath; he was running out of chakra. Each attack was fuelled by his chakra and the more he had the more he could attack. Not only was he physically exhausted but his chakra reserves were on red. He had only one explosive homing kunai and two explosive homing shuriken, he had used up the very last of his _Chakra Detecting Web launchers_-the tiny device he used on the tidal wave of bombs-and he had used his last _Chakra Attacking Drone_-the false phoenix kings heart. He only had enough in him for three solid plasma beams, or six photon beams, and since Ai was deactivated, he couldn't access the solar power function of his boots.

Naruto's clothes were in ruin; his hoodies arms were burnt low enough to be sleeveless, his inner shirt was ripped across the torso and down the neck, the knees of his pants had been slashed off from kami knows what.

He was a mess.

Konan's eyes hinted with sadness, following him as he landed on the ground with a faint _thud_ and a long _hiss_. "One your age should not know this world."

"Well, here we are." Naruto said with a small shrug.

"I know your plight, Naruto; you're suffering, your anguish…I want to liberate you from this world you've found yourself in."

The runaway didn't look impressed. "Liberate?"

"Set your soul free. End the misery brought upon you that forced you to build all your…devices."

"Ah," Naruto said with a twisted frown, subtly checking the back of his gloves. Three more minutes. "I was bound to meet someone with a god complex sooner or later."

Her eyes hardened and darkened at his words. "I am Konan, the Angel of Ame, child. I am not a god."

"You looked me in the eyes and called yourself an angel yet you don't think yourself a god?" he said, flicking his left hand from his eyes to her. "All I've seen you do I control paper and hover in one place. Don't overhype yourself, lady."

"Fine," she spat with light indignation. "You shall be the first outsider since the second war to behold my might."

A tornado of paper appeared at his back and Naruto whirled around, only to crash into the ground after a palm strike to his chest. He flipped back to his feet and bent under a roundhouse kick, flowing behind the woman and shooting a single beam of photon energy. Her body disintegrated into paper and reformed again. The woman looked down on him with dull eyes and surged back at him again in a blur of speed.

Fist to his stomach, elbow to her face but she leaned away and dug another fist into his side. A knee strike to her side and she caught it under her arm and jabbed two blows to his face, and sweeping his unstable leg off the ground, following his descent with a blow to the chest. She rose up and cracked her heel down on his panting, weak form, regarding him with almost too much boredom. He rolled aside from another axe kick, this one to his head, and staggered to his feet, heaving for air as much as his damaged ribs allowed. He blinked frantically to get the blood out of his vision.

He grinned widely, his blood painted teeth making even the chill Ame Kunoichi feel tendrils of hesitation roll through her. "Issa…" he said, wheezing and his voice slurring. "The besss you kin do…?" he chuckled darkly under his breath, like some sort of possessed, demented fiend.

She flashed to him with a savage backhand, grabbing his hair before he could get too far and smashing her knee into his weak abdomen again, eliciting a cry of pain from the boy. Her left pointer and middle finger poked out from her fist and she blazed it over his damaged right arm, grunting in frustration when the silver plating and the boy's tech glove prevented a great brunt of her attack from affecting him. She hissed and released his hair, bending as far right as her athletic body could allow when another short burst of photon energy wailed towards her heart, the heat of the fast attack burned off the upper right side of her Akatsuki garb. She grabbed the hand and pointed it up, carving an unforgiving upper cut towards his right armpit.

'_Oof, dislocated shoulder blade.'_

Konan grunted when he Spartan kicked her away from him and cradled his arm, panting heavily and looking at her with the intensity of a wild animal.

'_Need to get her closer…'_ he trailed off, hopping away when the woman kept appearing before him with paper shunshin. He got to eight metres from his former position before she managed to grab him by the scruff of the front of his shirt. _'Now!'_

_KkkuuuuuuuuuWWWWEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!_

The gradual crescendo of the sound screamed at the woman and she made to flee but was held in place by Naruto's left hand while his right, the one emitting the chakra cancelling sound, held her neck, far too close to her face, and thus her ears. She flashed high into the air but he was there with her, stubbornly holding her and gritting his teeth at his own pain in sustaining the painful sound.

_WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!_

Her paper fled from her, falling off her in large clumps as she crashed down onto the ground with her back. Her eyes rolled up into the back of her head as she grabbed her ears, vainly trying to block the super high pitched sound from entering. The sound wasn't affecting Naruto because it was his chakra that was causing it, flooding through a network of wires and circuits. He released her neck and flipped her onto her front.

A sharp jab to her neck with his left fingers held together.

She fell limp.

Naruto stopped the noise and tiredly dropped to his knees. His shadow clone came back to him a few seconds later.

"I gathered the other S ranks, boss." Naruto felt a sharp pain in his chest at the term his clone used. He nodded mutely and his copy picked up the woman's body, draping it on his shoulder and hopping to the hideout. He needed her alive to find out what the supposed leader of the Akatsuki could do.

Naruto was going to use the bastard.

That annoying bastard had derailed a great portion of his plans; at that very moment he sensed dozens of Kumo ninjas converging to his position. He picked through his hoodie with his left hand, a heavy sigh coming from his lips, too tired to care, and brought out an explosive kunai, stabbing it into the ground and clicking the end. He cradled his battered right arm to his belly, now truly not able to use it again, and shakily got to his feet as smoke poured from the knife. He closed his eyes and tried not to inhale the smoke, dispelling his shadow clone; memories rushed into his head of the location of his mountain hideout. His red eyes flashed open and he looked up.

He took off from the ground, his chakra presence covered up by the smoke.

His katana followed him half a minute later.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Naruto landed on his left side, finally out of usable chakra. He cried silently and crawled with as much strength he could muster, feeling a few sprained muscles in his left arm. He got his feet back under him and stumbled into the cave. Three dead bodies and three unconscious bodies, the living ones being bounded by ninja wire and thick wraps of duct tape. Even if they miraculously woke up, they wouldn't be able to move because Naruto had shut down their networks; it was their inactive networks that kept the asleep.

Naruto didn't care about them though.

His feet shuffled as quickly as a winded, tried, weak child could. His back hunched forward in pain and holding both of his arms to his stomach, trying his best not to aggravate his injuries anymore. He fell onto his knees before his duffle bag and spared his right hand, keeping a firm hand on his wrist to minimize movement. He jaggedly unzipped the bag and tossed clothes and weapons out. He ignored his katana as it clattered before the cave, inactive.

"Where is it? Where is it?" he whispered, breathlessly in pain. His shaking hand brought out his first aid kit and tore it open, rummaging inside. "C'mon, where is it?" he tipped the contents of the box to the stony floor and searched again, more thoroughly, and rumbled both in frustration and agony. He was out of painkillers and rubbing alcohol, the only things there were bandages, band aids and, he used his teeth to remove a syringe cap, antibacterial and antibiotics. He jammed a needle into his upper right arm and ran the second into his side, clenching his teeth so as not to cry out again. The very last one went to his left bicep, a muscle relaxant, and the results was almost immediate; the sharp, heavy pulse of his sprained muscles reduced to a dull throb.

He was afraid of what he would see once he unarmed and removed his right computer glove.

His heart rate spiked at what he saw. "That's…that's not good."

Purple discolorations spotted his right arm, from his fingers to his shoulder, there were three particularly disgusting looking welts on his lower arm and two on his upper, where two bones stuck out from his lower and only one from his upper. His shoulder flopped uselessly, dislocated, and the broken skin caused by the compound fractured bones had blood paint his arm gruesomely.

His mangled and bent out of shape arm, he thought grimly, was a mess.

He tried not to think of the possibility of losing his arm and searched his duffle bag with his one good, albeit damaged, arm and retrieved what looked like a metallic splint. It was sturdy and made out of strong, though somewhat flexible metal. He gently slipped his right arm into the splint and tapped both sides of the elbow, pulling back a leather strap to hold in his upper and lower arms. The splint had four pieces of metal on both sides of his battered arm, two for the upper and two for the lower, with a brown leather strap seemingly holding both together. The sides of the elbow had two one inch circles on them that slowly blinked with red lights. He tapped the light on the left side of the elbow and silver segmented armour crept up his whole arm, covering it completely. The boy went on and strapped leather across his left side, returning the strap to the right shoulder, more segmented armour crept up to his shoulder.

He closed his right fist as tightly as he could and breathed in and out, quickly and desperately, before he shot chakra through the _Techno-Splint/Brace_.

His whole world turned white and he collapsed onto his back. He couldn't even register his screams. When he came to the sides of his brace blinked green and blue, meaning that the fractured bones had been set and the dislocated shoulder and shoulder blade had been adjusted.

He was still in an entire _dimension_ of pain.

Naruto's bellow of suffering echoed from the cave.

**Authors note**

**I'm aware these come few and far in between but I felt like putting it.**

**Next time on ****Redlights**

_Mikoto had never known such torment._

_Not in her many years of being successful Kunoichi._

"_Pyyyyeeeeee!" she cried, screaming as her insides were pushed aside by the ravaging member. "Pyyeeeeeee! Ssshhhhtapppppp!" one massive phallus pushed against her clenched shut butthole and her eyes bugged out. A scream ripped from her lungs as the giant member shot its way into her body, going in and out in tandem with the one in her womanhood. Seven foot tall, green skinned, potbellied, beady eyed monsters-ogres-grunted and snorted, surrounding her in all sides, naked as the day they were manifested and holding out their junk to her face and hands, savagely jerking off. They waited for the two in both of her lower holes to finish but grew impatient, forcing her hands to service them and her mouth to perform the impossible task of servicing each and all with her throat. "GghhnggnnggH!"_

_This punishment was excruciating._

_Torn open after hours of being thrown around and crudely mended, only to be skewered to pieces._

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

"_Shhh," Naruto whispered. His remained immobile, pointing his humming red palmed glove at the frightened girl, ever ready to melt her torso if she made the wrong move. The darkness of the corner of the room he sat in did nothing to drive the fear of kami into her; blood red eyes shone from her desk chair. He motioned for her to enter fully. "Shut the door, Kasi."_

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Dark rinnegan eyes stared at the boys turned back with unhidden disdain. The waves crashed and smashed into the shores of his Cliffside hideout. Pein didn't see his serene smile as he watched the landscape of water thrash and smash against the rocks, never truly able to reach him. The thunderstorm had subsided to a low, almost casual drizzle._

_The view was…nice._

"_Where is Konan?" the deva path asked, the other paths standing to its side._

_After a charged silence, Naruto said. "Somewhere _relatively_ safe." He tossed the Akatsuki ring over his shoulder; the corpse caught the tiny object. Naruto had also taken the privilege of nullifying all the seals on her person, so no tracking seal could find her. "I want us to…talk…Nagato."_

_The boy looked over his shoulder with a secret smile._

"_About Konan's safety."_

**Woof…**

**That's it for this chapter.**

**What do you think? How was the fight?**

**Where do you think Naruto would go from here? I'm aware that Naruto is playing with, not just fire, but a lion **_**made out of **_**fire, but what do you think Naruto's going to tell Nagato?**

**Also, as you can all guess, what is happening to Mikoto is that she is really, in every sense of the word, being **_**Tsukoyomi mind raped**_**. Graphic, I know. It's going to turn a few stomachs. Is that what Naruto wants to happen to her in the Tsukoyomi?**

**Drop a review on your thoughts, would you so kindly. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you :)**

**Foy.**


	12. Chapter 12

**Hey**

**Shout out to PinkiePieParty122894, BigY1308, Dancingrage( thanks, dude!), Spark681, aishi, Dawood Saqlain (I appreciate it, thank you very much, man), s.k.f.f.f, 36Barry72 (thanks for reading!), TheKing91 (I try my best, thank you!), lord 7th and saiyan prince1. I really appreciate all of you guys :)**

**Some might not think this is necessary, but Naruto's fight against Mikoto, Orochimaru and Akatsuki ended at about one in the afternoon.**

**There are going to be POV changes. Also, I'm not gonna describe the magnet. There's a whole lot more going on in this chapter.**

**Before you begin, another reminder on a previously explained ability of Naruto's tech. A hexagon spins in front of Naruto's right eye when he's preparing to use his Chakra Destabilizer; it's called his **_**Chakra Signature**_** setting. This is because he combined an inverted view of the world with infrared so he can see people's chakra signatures. This setting is incredibly important, unbelievably so if any is able to get their hands on it.**

**This is a very long chapter. I'm honestly tired.**

**Warning: this chapter contains graphic sexual assault. It might trigger or it might offend. I'll drop a warning.**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 12

Naruto could hear the TV from upstairs, through the open bedroom door.

_Today, at about ten minutes after nine in the morning, there was a terrorist attack from two Kunoichi, one of which is identified as Orochimaru of the Sannin, missing ninja of Konohagakure no Sato, the other of which cannot be identified and is so far not linked to any village._

He guessed that an artist sketch of a masked Mikoto came up on the screen.

_The attack was against a Snow country visitor by the name Sou Azayaka as he returned from shopping in King Bolt Superstore._

A picture of Sou replaced that of Mikoto's image. Naruto wasn't too worried that his records would be confirmed to be in the Snow country servers because he was very thorough in his background creation.

_The officer that allowed Sou into Kumo has said that he admitted to being easily mistaken for the son of the Yondaime Hokage. His location is currently not known but his last confirmed location is a field in northern Kumogakure where it is speculated that he fought the two terrorists and five more so far unidentified infiltrators. Here is an eye witness's video recording of the fight in front of King Bolt Superstore._

The young genius closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of people screaming, a loud thud of what he could only guess was when he hit his right foot on the ground.

_Sou is reportedly a civilian of Snow country and has not reported in the PTP registration office of Snow country that he has any sort of taijutsu training or technologically combative weaponry on his person or in his possession. Until the situation concerning the terrorists, the infiltrators and Sou Azayaka's health have been confirmed, Lord Raikage has ordered there to be a shutdown of all nonessential activities within Kumogakure. The borders have been closed and the police and ninja are in collaboration in the search for Sou. We ask that all civilians and genin remain indoors until this situation is solved and that anyone with any kind of helpful information report it to the necessary authorities._

A, the Raikage of Kumo, came up, saying in his recognizably deep voice.

"_All we want are answers."_ He cleared his voice and seemed to adjust himself in his office seat. _"The safety of my people is top priority and if we have somehow invited a security risk into our village, it is in our best interest to arrest him and bring him in for questioning. As of now, Sou Azayaka, Engineering major of Snow University, is wanted for interrogation."_ He fixed the camera with a strong look, lacing his fingers together on his desk. _"Sou…if you're watching this…come quietly."_

Naruto scoffed. The newscaster cleared his throat nervously.

_That was Lord A. Thankfully; no one was harmed in the attack. We at Channel Seven implore that citizens be patient and cooperative to authority. Onto other news, the bounty on the son of the Yondaime Hokage, Uzumaki Naruto, has been decreased by five hundred, million ryu, by order of Lord Raikage…_

The TV buzzed on and on and Naruto's mind briefly wondered; the Raikage _definitely_ knew he was Naruto and _not_ Sou but he didn't want to cause general panic that the wanted boy was in the village. The supposed grandparents Sou had in Snow were on vacation in Mountain country, so the authorities of Snow country couldn't get in contact with them. Snow University had records of his graduating but past students would say they didn't remember any Sou Azayaka. Naruto, as usual, wasn't worried; he would disappear like had done before. Any trace to him had been cleaned up already; the Akatsuki were currently cooling in the mountain hideout he had fashioned for himself, their weapons were with them. _Konan_ was still unconscious, lying haphazardly on the cold, hard floor.

He shifted a little and winced.

Damn it.

Still no painkillers and since the village was practically on fire, on red alert, he wouldn't be getting any the right way anytime soon.

"I'm going to bed, dad!"

"So soon? But there's no school tomorrow. Hope you're ok." Naruto set his left hand on the arm of the desk chair and faced it at the door, humming lowly with plasma energy. The girl's father was concerned because Kasi had been close to the initial attack, Naruto guessed, reducing the intensity of his beam from plasma to photon.

"I'm just…really, really tired." Drilling a fifteen year old girl questions for the better part of the day could do that.

"Are you sure-"

"I'm fine, dad. Goodnight." The girl stomped up the stairs and the door creaked open. She entered the room was pitch black and she made to flick on the switch but stopped when she saw a pair of red eyes in the dark corner of her room where her desk was, and a quietly humming white light sitting on the arm of her chair.

"Shhh," Naruto whispered. He remained immobile, pointing his humming red palmed glove at the frightened girl, ever ready to melt her torso if she made the wrong move. The darkness of the corner of the room he sat in did nothing to drive the fear of kami into her; blood red eyes shone from her desk chair. He motioned for her to enter fully. "Shut the door, Kasi…quietly."

The girl paled and frantically nodded, slowly closing the door with trembling hands. Her whole body quaked with fear, still holding the doorknob with her eyes clenched shut. Naruto saw her shoulders shake and he leaned back into his eat with a small sigh.

"Step away from the door, Kasi."

She bobbed her head quickly and walked backwards, clearly scared of even looking at him. She moved to the other side of the room and covered her face with her hands.

"Don't scream." She nodded again. A guest speaker at her former middle school, a retired jounin, had said that to avoid harm in the occurrence of a home invasion was to follow the orders of the person without hesitation. She recognized the red eyes of the person sitting in the dark as the person she had met in the morning, the one building the giant magnet. She had a front row view of his fighting skills and the tech he had on him. He was now a fugitive. "Sit down." She plopped down on the edge of her bed, still not looking at him and shaking something furious, more scared than anything in her life.

The girl watched the mocha skinned girl in silence and exhaled again, powering down his left glove and kicking his feet before him under the desk, crossing his ankles.

"I'm not going to hurt you, Kasi." He stated and slipped his hand from his computer glove, which still stayed on the arm of the desk chair, and wiggled them. She peeked between her fingers.

"A-Are you going to kidnap me?" she got a good look at him then, her grey eyes squinting in confusion at his state.

He was wearing a short sleeved black shirt with a noughts and crosses design on the front and black pants that stopped over his ankles with black sneakers, the same he wore that morning. Over his torso was a dark blue hoodie, with the hoodie flopping back. His right hand wasn't in the sleeve and she clearly saw a metal contraption on his right arm, held up by a white sling. His left hand, slung through the hoodie sleeve, and she noticed that the thing that formerly shone white was a black glove with a red palm, sitting comfortably on the arm of her chair. There was a small backpack sitting at his feet and a pair of goggles on her desk, next to her computer.

He shook his head with a snort.

"I…" he cleared his throat. "I need your help, Kasi." Her hands dropped and her mouth opened to speak but he beat her to it. "Nothing illegal, I promise." He stood up with a grunt, his un-firm left hand holding him up by the desk. He ambled to her and, to her surprise; he plopped down by her side with a pained groan.

"You're going to-" she moved away from him slightly, her eyes wide and fearful.

"No." he said with an exhale. "I won't do that."

She was still in her work clothes of a yellow and white shirt, black pants with the work nametag on her left chest, heavily perspiring from a day of constant activity. Her mind turned. "Then what do you want with me?"

"Help me build my magnet," he shook his head and interrupted her. "It won't take more than an hour, I have the exact schematics with me and the instructions in perfect detail. I'll be out of your hair and you'll never hear from me again, I promise."

Her eyebrows moved up her forehead. "Why can't you do it? I don't know anything about magnets."

"My arm is busted, so if I do it, it's most likely I'll slow myself down if anything, and you know enough to identify I wanted to make a magnet by just looking at my trolley."

"That doesn't prove anything."

"I looked through your school record." He didn't look at her surprised face. "You've been at top of your class since the start of your schooling year and your teachers have written comments on how, if you pass your next five tests with distinction they would recommend you for a class promotion."

"H-How-"

"I'm good with computers."

Her mouth gaped wordlessly at his words.

He looked at her. "I'll pay you."

"Pay me?"

"Ten million."

Her eyes grew to the side of dinner plates and she yelled. "Ten mill-"

He covered her mouth with his left hand. "Quiet." He dropped his hand when he was sure she won't scream. "Two and a half million in four accounts, all in your name but under different aliases so no one gets suspicious." He smiled slightly at her flabbergasted face, the question unsaid all over her expression. "Like I said, I'm good with computers."

"But…but…but…" she gurgled, trying to find her voice. "What am I going to do with _ten million ryu_?"

"Whatever you want, as long as you don't say where you got it from or run stir crazy spending it."

"I-I-I'm just a freshman, the biggest magnet I've ever built was as small as my hand."

"Consider this a lesson then." Naruto flicked his left hand and his bag whizzed to him. He stopped it with his foot and unzipped it, bringing out a flat disk shaped piece of metal with a small pane of circular glass on top. He tossed it to the ground and said. "Activate _Satellite Magnet Schematics_," her eyes bugged out as beams of light shot out from the disk, coloured images of rectangular files rolled out above, revolving in a circle before their eyes. He swiped his right hand through the light and picked out one. "Ah, yes, model 11." His fingers tapped the folder and it opened, revealing image after image of magnets he had designed himself. Written instructions and step-by-step illustrations flew around the room in glorious, coordinated streams of light.

"This is…" she whispered, at awe. "…Wow…" she tore her eyes from the images and looked at him, stars in her eyes. "How-"

He answered with a lopsided smile. "I'll walk you through whatever you don't get." He got up and walked to her window, drawing the blinds to allow in the star speckled light of the countryside, a comfortable distance from Kumo proper. Outside hovered a platform that puffed air from the bottom and sides, silently and without any possible detection. Atop the hovering platform were all the tools she needed. He stood back and the platform slipped into the room and gently landed on the ground.

She ran to the supplies with crazed eyes and he walked around the board to his bag, retrieving a flashdrive and a long black cord.

"There is an Auto-demagnetizer in my bag, so don't worry about the magnet going off randomly. The hologram is easy enough to use; swipe left and right, up and down, diagonally, whatever, or if you have a good memory you can memorize the names of the illustrations and say it out loud." There really wasn't an end to the amazement this red eyed boy was bringing her. Everything she needed to build the magnet lay before her and the plans flew _around_ her. "You have to be quiet though; I don't have the tech to muffle sounds, not anything big enough to cover a room."

Kasi looked at him; in her hands was a long roll of copper wires. "What will you be doing…?"

"Call me Sou," he used his foot to move the desk chair before the desk, keeping his back to her and setting down the flashdrive and the cord beside the goggles. "I'll be borrowing your computer for another project." He went back to his bag and removed a similar Holo-disk from inside, throwing it accurately to the desk and pulling out the last object he needed, a small box helpfully labelled _Repair kit_. His Holo-disk wasn't as good as his Hologram projectors, in Naruto's opinion, because the projectors provided a wider range of services, while he could only store a specific amount of information in the disk seeing as it had limited memory space.

"What do you possibly you want to do with my computer?" she asked in bewilderment. This guy practically had technology better than Kumo could ever make in the next fifty or so years. Her computer too was an old model and this dude had hologram disks!

He sat down and grinned at her a little. "I want to fix my friend."

She didn't even want to ask. Her cheeks tinted red in embarrassment at the quiet laughter of the young genius. She then stood up and probed. "How do you know I haven't told the police I gave you my number?"

She spun around on his chair and said with a close eyed smile. "Because you haven't."

She sniffed, rubbing her cheeks to rid herself of her stubborn blush. "…Fair enough."

Kasi watched as he opened the repair kit and took out a tiny screwdriver, using it to unscrew the screen on the goggles and revealing a dizzying array of wires and chips. He then turned on her computer and said to the holo-disk on the desk. "Bring up Ai repair schematics." He looked into the melted cluster of wires and chips and muttered, when the holo-disk flickered on and running through a few files before landing on the one where he detailed how to repair Ai during the event of it being damaged. "Burnt processor and cracked sensory disks." The repair folder flipped through a few sub-files and stopped at the scenario he had written concerning the words he had just said. "Restoration or replacement." The lights blinked red and the boy sighed. He only had one useable hand, so it was going to be very hard. "Ah…replacement it is."

He then plugged in one end of the black cord into the goggles and the other into the fully booted computer, sliding in the flashdrive a moment later after three lights in the goggles blinked red three times. He went back to the goggles and used his screwdriver to remove the processor chip. He put in a new processor chip from his pocket and the computer screen tinkled.

_Ai backup files_

Naruto moved the mouse and clicked.

_COMPREHENSIVE restoration of backup files or SPECIFIC restoration of backup files_

Naruto clicked 'COMPREHENSIVE'.

_Error! Damaged memory chip! New processor chip detected!_

Naruto breathed out tiredly and went to his goggles, saying. "Damaged memory chip." The holo-disk swiped to the instructions Naruto had written if Ai's memory chipped was ever broken; he took out a different screwdriver, this one about the same small size but fizzling at the tip with electricity. He tapped and poked her and there, looking to the instructions and back again, recalling as best as he could and confirming once again. He didn't really forget how to fix his own computer; it was so that he didn't make any mistake in fixing Ai.

He clicked on 'COMPREHENSIVE' again.

_New processor chip detected!_

Naruto checked the memory chip, it was good, then he readjusted the processor chip, humming with approval that it was in the right place. He moved back to the computer and clicked on 'COMPREHENSIVE' again, selecting 'IGNORE' when the alert came up.

_Loading backup files. Would you like to review them?_

_Click. _YES.

He scratched his chin as every single file on Ai came up on the screen, neatly arranged into time stamped files and arranged into even more detail, like on response to instruction, logical reasoning, environmental observations, lessons from boss and many, many more. _Thousands_ more.

The fingers of his left hand swiftly moved on the keyboard and the screen blacked out, a complicated roll of numbers ran up the screen and the blonde boy looked at each set of numbers intently. He then said to his silent observer.

"Get to work, Kasi."

"A-Ah, right."

He studied the codes with extreme focus and then clacked his fingers on the keyboard again, satisfied that the codes for Ai were in order. The screen returned back to normal. He looked to the hologram on the repair of his super computers burnt processor chip; he could easily replace the cracked sensory disks but that could be done later seeing as he didn't have them on him, they were in the mountain base.

There was hope that Ai would come back from digital death but the question was if it would be the same as before.

Naruto had programmed Ai to backup every single bit of data it had every five seconds of every five days, making the thousands upon thousands of data on Kasi's computer the most comprehensive set of information on the planet. He had checked himself; the backup included deflecting the Tsukoyomi and the Ai's codes were up-to-date, including the ones with the recent update in them.

He had set a date for his rocket to take off from earth, next week, and he wouldn't allow his broken arm to push that date back. He had most of the parts ready; the fuel tank and gallons of fuel were in Demon country, the satellite's receivers were in the mountain, the thrusters' and the capsule could be built just as quickly. What Naruto wouldn't stand for was for Ai, his computer companion, to not be with him for any longer.

Hence why he had asked Kasi to help him with the satellite magnet while he fixed Ai.

"Activate goggles." The lights of the goggles flicked from red to green, meaning it was activated but not operational. He slid the holo-disk to the goggles and said. "Connect goggles to holo-disk. Show me Ai's brain."

The brain that came up was greatly different to the one he saw in his Cliffside base. The numbers were still, unmoving and cold, and it was all squeezed into a perfect, tight sphere. It was a lifeless black. Nothing moved on the brain, nothing pulsed.

Dead.

Naruto blinked his eyes to stop the tears from coming. Not now, he bit, more to himself than anything. The end of the flashdrive blinked blue once and a different file appeared before Naruto.

_Retrieved _Ai_ files. Merge with Ai backup files and restore?_

He clicked the mouse. 'OK'.

On the computer screen, a dialogue box opened up with a file throwing a sheet of paper to another file, over and over again, while the black hologram of Ai's brain slowly started filling up with blue light, from bottom to top, like it was a water balloon.

He sat back in his chair and swerved around towards a busily reading and working Kasi, lost in thought.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Flashback: Six hours ago_

_04:09PM_

_Naruto's mountain base_

Konan woke up with a start, gasping and looking around the sun illuminated surroundings she had found herself in; the walls were made from chiselled rock, and so was the ground, there was a wide opening before her, far, far before her, meaning that she was in a cave somewhere. She looked to her right and started when she caught a pair of yellow, snake-like eyes. The person was sickly pale with dark bags underneath her eyes with streaking black hair. Her mouth was gagged and Konan tried to speak, ask where she was, only to realize her mouth was covered as well.

The Angel of Ame made to move her hands but wheezed, weaker than she had ever felt in a very long time. Ropes bit into her wrists and her ankles, tying both in a special knot that held them together but separate enough that dislocating her wrists would free her from the rope. Her arms were uncomfortably tied to her side, making her hands forcefully kept down on her lower back and her thighs were also tied together, tight. She was on her knees, like the snake-eyed woman.

Her foggy memory tried to remember what she had been doing previously; who was she, who was this lady, where was she, what had she been doing? Questions and questions flooded painfully through her head and she cried into her gag, muffled and almost non-existent, as a sharp headache flashed through her head. When she opened her eyes again, cautiously, she saw her Akatsuki garb lying on the ground close to the mouth of the cave but not by much, soaked in engine oil, used like a rag for what's eh could not even guess.

Akstsuki!

Yes! She was in the Akatsuki!

Her name was…Ka-no-Ki-…no-Konan…yes…

Angel of Ame.

It all came back to her and the snake-eyed lady's eyes curved up with amusement as the normally expressionless paper angel looked raptured at the things coming into her head; she too had gone through this temporary amnesia not too long ago and it wasn't pleasant. Not by a long shot. She almost jumped when Konan futelily tried to move again, Orochimaru tutted in reprimand. They both had their chakra sealed.

Well…all three of them…if she counted Mikoto, but the Konoha Kunoichi was a lost cause at this point. She knew the signs of being in a sharingan induced genjutsu, from years of study and training. Her thoughts came back to her when she heard Konan mutely squawking in surprise, extremely out of character for her, and saw the pile of dead bodies to her immediate left.

Kakuzu…Tobi…Itachi…and who she could only guess was Hidan, because all that remained of his were a pair of legs connected to a pelvis.

What…happened to them?

They were sent out on a mission…yes…

To kill!

Who-

"Good, you're both awake." Someone said four feet before both kneeling Kunoichi. He was in predominantly dark clothes, with a sling holding up his broken arm, hidden beneath a dark hoodie. The thing he wanted to do required that both be awake. He had on a different pair of goggles; this one was roughly the same size as his normal pair but was a bright shade of white with a black tinted screen.

He had taken a long nap since the fight and every movement didn't feel like hell anymore. His chakra was back at approvable, useable levels and he had the opportunity to clean himself up.

They saw a blue hexagon spinning before Naruto's right eye, on the computer goggles, and the red eye behind the spinning shape looked down at them with ominous darkness.

Orochimaru grinned despite her gag and squealed. "Nato!"

He shot her a look that silenced her.

"The human brain…the mind…is like a safe; with the exact right combination it can be opened and all within can be used. The thing is that, from what I know, the contents within the mind can be likened to codes on a computer; thoughts, emotions, observations, memories, whether positive or negative, spinning around in the storm that is the mind." he stepped to Orochimaru and held his left hand away from him to the side. His glove whizzed and clicked in place onto his hand, though not arming. "Every person has a different combination to crack the safe that is the brain. Once the brain has been opened, then the safe cracker can not only gather whatever he or she wants from the targets mind, alter those memories and influence them. It's almost like…playing a guitar; strike the right cords and pluck the right strings and we have a harmony of sounds but in this case 'adjusting' and 'retouching' individual memories and thoughts, even emotions, can end with the victim being effectively brainwashed." He bent down and looked the snake woman right in her eyes. "Understand what I'm saying?"

Orochimaru gulped.

"I won't be dumb enough to tell either of you how I'm going to get this done," he poked the growingly irate scientists head. "What I will do…is copy what's inside your head, _both of you_, and change whatever the hell I want."

He wasn't lying when he said he could crack open the human mind.

The Chakra Signature setting of his goggles used to be controlled by Ai, so that the computer would quickly tune in to each person's individual chakra signature at record speed but Naruto had to bring out a spare pair of gloves and painstakingly activate it himself by combining infrared and inverting vision. The world before his right eye was almost pitch black, except small patches of grey. The two women before him were also different; their interior was mostly made out of blackness, besides seven distinct spots in their bodies and a hazy line of chakra connecting all seven points. Their main tenketsu, Naruto thought with a wry smile, held the key to opening the mind.

He heavily placed his good hand on the weakly thrashing snake woman and the woman froze as low vibrations ran from his palm, into her head and into her seven tenketsu. Her mouth dropped open and her eyes rolled up into the back of her head as her mental defences came undone at his slight prodding. The chakra points fell apart and the glove processed the almost willing feedback of information from the woman's head, his computer goggles analysed them and turned the data into readable, understandable information for the young inventor.

A sharp beam of light shot from the back of Naruto's gloved hand and he looked up, marvelling at the outstanding mind of Konoha's most wanted ninja. It was a motley green and grey colour, like her disgusting chakra, roughly shaped like a normal brain and it gurgled and spat above him, churning slowly with subtle activity.

The scientists mind was truly…extensive, for lack of a better word.

There was everything, from taijutsu to some engineering work, to medicine to shinobi catalogues, to kekkai genkai replication to hidden village weaknesses, to blackmail and ninja weaknesses, to medical tests and scientific experiments, to memories of the second and third shinobi wars.

Everything.

Naruto smirked.

"I'll admit…this is a lot." His visors blurred with activity and his smirk widened into a full blown grin. "Where do I even _start_ with this thing?"

A hollow sound echoed from the Sannin's mouth and he chuckled, a foreign sound to Konan's ear.

"Copy everything." Naruto said after a short pause.

The spare goggles made a tinkling sound and started scanning through the brain of the self-proclaimed strongest Sannin.

"Organize it all into specific folders; taijutsu into Taijutsu, ninjutsu into Ninjutsu, and so on." the bottom left of the goggles blinked blue once. "For the scientific experiments, do the same thing, clump them all into the same file but," he said, making sure to emphasize how serious he was. "Do not, and I mean, do not copy memories of her torturing kids."

Three minutes later and it was done, not as fast as Ai would have done it but the spare computer had done its best, all according to its creator's instruction.

Naruto's limited though still immensely expansive studies and research into the human body, which would go a long way in his designs of his gloves and boots, was what had brought his attention to the effects of low, nearly unheard and unfelt sound and vibrations on the human body. He knew that emitting a person-specific sound from his goggles or gloves would result in the targets system being turned off for a long period of time, but Naruto had recently discovered the effect of accompanying the low sound to low vibrations with Obito. In the ninjas last moments, as he used the high pitched squeal to tear down his chakra, he had felt not only the tenketsu disconnect itself from the man's body but there had been a strange _click_ under his hand.

For most that won't have meant anything. Hell, for most, they won't have even felt the click.

The sensation for a targets chakra being flicked off was like water was rushing out of the target, invisible, unfelt and unheard water, but this time there was a _click_.

It was a long shot and it was likely to fail, but he tried the sound and vibration combination on Obito's corpse. The brainwaves had long since stopped and the body was cooling but the boy was able to gather _Surface Memories_, which were memories from the past year and not from the beginning of his life. This included emotions felt within this timeframe and thoughts that went through his head.

He copied it all.

Itachi's mind too.

He couldn't with Kakuzu because he had previously blown out his brain and for Hidan he had disintegrated his whole upper body, and even if he could with Hidan he wouldn't; the priest was reputably insane, he wouldn't bother with him.

Naruto wasn't sure if he could actually alter these memories but there was no other available guinea pig to use but these two experienced Kunoichi.

He would go to Mikoto later and see what he could scavenge from her mind.

The frequency of the vibration changed, humming lower and lower, while the pitch of the sound increased to just a quiet whistle.

The hologram of Orochimaru's brain expanded over his head. He pinpointed the part of her brain that was absolutely obsessed with him. He prodded that spot on her mind, a light touch, and it bent into itself like a field after a bomb had been dropped, warping those memories drastically. He could gather that her ultimate plan for him was to recruit him to her side, brainwash him into loyalty and then steal his body and his knowledge. The thoughts were perverse, involving dreams and wishes to ravage him over and over again.

He wiped away that plan for him.

He touched another side of her mind and it curved into itself, like before, as if his touch meant death. He wasn't quite sure what he had done, not really, but he was too excited to find out.

He removed his hand and the woman fell to her side, shaking and convulsing. She finally came to…

Orochimaru felt…defiled…

Like her whole body had been used as a rag to clean up jizz from a male member, over and over again. Her throat was parched and she licked her lips, wetting them and _praying_ she didn't taste semen. She exhaled in relief when she didn't. She cleared her throat and looked around, briefly confused on where she was and why she was tied up, though her body shivered at the feeling of losing what dignity she had as, used continuously without remorse or conscience.

Naruto bent down on one knee before her and her eyes bulged.

A scream ripped out from her _soul_.

She fell down onto her face and vainly tried to wiggle away, like some sort of twisted worm, but when that didn't work, Orochimaru of the Sannin started blubbering for mercy. Begging and pleading for leniency. Gentle hands laced through her hair and violently yanked her up, forcing her to look into the cold visors of the tech genius. His twisted smirk served only to drive a stake into her heart, chilling her down to her soul.

"Your…scared of me…" he whispered. He released her and her face crashed back to the ground, her nose cracked messily and bled around her. "I can use this…" he kicked her side lightly, turning her over from her face to her side, he grabbed her cheeks with his left hand, having to gently move his right arm a bit to do so. "I want you to do something for me, Orochimaru."

"Anything!" she screamed pitifully.

"I want you to watch my back _from afar_," he said, stressing the last parts. "You're going to go back to Oto and tear down everything you have concerning me, rip it all to shreds. Tell your ninjas to stay away from me and you are to do so yourself, until I tell you otherwise." He looked up in thought, mulling over something in his mind, before he said. "Also…_convince_ as many hidden villages and countries as possible to take me off their wanted lists and their bingo books, starting from here in Kumo. Use violence if you have to, I don't care. Understood?"

"Yes, sir, of course, sir." She slurred and he pushed her face away, swiping his hand at a single rope on her lower back. A bolt of photon light cut the rope and the rest fell apart. He bent down and jabbed her neck, releasing her chakra for her.

"Get lost."

As Orochimaru fled the mountain base, Naruto turned to the purple haired angel with a dark smile.

He couldn't very well send Orochimaru to Konoha _specifically_. His mother would tear Orochimaru to _pieces_ and intensify her efforts in retrieving her son.

He needed someone stronger.

He placed his hand on Konan's head, ignoring her useless struggling and shaking, and opened up her mind.

Maybe _she_ knew someone he could use…

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Flashback end_

The Kumogakure News Station was hiding information from the public.

A few minutes after Naruto had let Orochimaru off, there had been an attempt on the Raikage's life by the mad Sannin. The insane snake woman had yelled at her opponent, both at a stalemate in the power department, that if he did not leave Naruto Uzumaki alone, then Orochimaru would _gas_ the whole village. The Raikage knew the scientist could and would do that. A the Raikage was faster but Orochimaru was smarter; she could think of a few slick moves to make the man's legendary speed, rivalling that of the Yellow Flash, into a nuisance than a blessing. He called back his hunter ninjas and changed his tactics from looking for Naruto to looking for _Sou_, carefully skirting what he was told not to do. He had limited his search to inside his village.

For the sake of his people, he needed to play it safe.

Naruto jumped in his seat and slid his left glove onto his one good hand, not fully armed but glowing a dim white, ready with a photon beam, at the door when he heard heavy footfalls coming up the stairs. Kasi, flinching in surprise at the blurring movement, quietly shouted.

"My dad!" Naruto looked at her with furrowed eyebrows. She pointed at the door and stood up, skittering to the door with hesitant steps. "It's my dad."

He wanted to ask how she was so sure but stopped himself; the guesthouse her father owned had fifteen rooms, three of which were occupied, one by her, one by him and one by an actual guest. Business wasn't too good but they were getting through life fairly fine. He noticed that she had been working with her long, wavy white hair tied up in a messy ponytail on top of her head, and she had rolled up the short sleeves of her yellow and white work shirt, showing her thin light brown arms and a curious looking gash on her right shoulder.

The tiredness from before fled her a long time ago, when Naruto asked her to build his magnet for him; the money wasn't really on her mind but the detailed information Naruto had allowed her to read concerning magnets would surely, surely, come in handy with her homework.

Kasi grabbed the doorknob and glared at the blonde boy, a bit stronger. "It's _my_ dad."

The boy frowned slightly and lowered his hand, powering down the glove and lifting his left hand in surrender. "Fine. Have it your way."

Her tough exterior crumbled at his last words and her cheeks burned with embarrassment. She slapped her cheeks with both of her hands and unrolled her work shirt sleeves. She slipped outside just as the man was about to enter. Naruto listened to their conversation from the thin crack of the open door.

"I thought you'd be sleeping by now," it seemed he wanted to walk around her into her room but the girl stopped him with a small shout, blocking his way with her body. "I was hearing voices from your room."

"It's nothing, I was about to get something to drink." She yawned, a fake sound that didn't appease the man.

"Are you sure you're not doing something…_weird_…in there?" she snorted. "Your fifteen, your body is changing in ways even _I_ don't understand-"

"Daddyyyyy stapppp-"

She squealed again when he wanted to peer into her room. "Are you sure you don't have anyone in your room with you?" he looked at her with knowing eyes and a small smirk. The girls face was practically red. "A boy, maybe."

"A boy?!" her voice was high pitched, yet somehow disbelieving of his suspicions. "Why would _I_ have a _boy_ in my room? Ridiculous!" Naruto rolled his eyes and glanced at the progress of the backup and retrieval of his computer friend. Twenty percent.

"You're at that age of getting more and more curious-"

"Nuuuuu." She groaned pitifully and pushed her cackling father away, her thin arms and slim, petite gait not doing much against the thundering, muscular form of her father civilian. "Goooooooo."

Naruto began to wonder; was this how normal teenagers behaved?

Flustered, emotional and hormonal?

He didn't know.

His childhood didn't exactly expose him to great examples of a person's teenage years and the most he knew were from romantic movies his mother, Mikoto and a whole wave of other females watched during the weekend. He was forced to watch with them, acting as their group plushie. He refused to believe that all teens were perpetually being ravaged by love related emotions and the urge to break out into song.

He could guess that Kasi didn't have that many male friends, so she wasn't too sure on how to react at being accused of having a boy in her room, of all places. She was also nearly always blushing when she looked at him, which he didn't quite understand but he didn't really have enough concern in him to question; she wasn't sick, as far as he knew, so it wasn't anything serious. The boy had done his digging on Kasi's family.

Her mother passed away when she was younger and her father had been working as a blacksmith before he used his savings to buy a guesthouse. His wife's older brother was a retired jounin and he had two children, Darui, Karui and Omoi-from oldest to youngest-, with Darui being the apprentice to the Raikage, Karui and Omoi being on the same genin team as Samui, under their sensei Kirabi, also known as Killer Bee, the Eight tailed jinchuriki, who was in turn the younger brother to the Raikage. Naruto had traced their digital history to the very last person, going as far as finding out that Samui had a brother named Atsui and Kirabi had a podcast where he displayed his _deplorable_ rapping skills. Nothing was ever safe when Naruto got his hands on his tablet _or_ his goggles, spare or Ai.

Kasi was fairly trustworthy, not giving up the fact that she gave her number to Sou to the Kumo black ops or the police.

For the life of him, Naruto didn't want anything to happen to her because of her association with him, like with Hino, the top Yakuza enforcer and, to a lesser extent, Shion, the Demon country Daimyo.

He got up from the chair and staggered to the door as it opened, the girl crying for him not to enter, tugging the back of his shirt in a vain attempt at pulling him back. The door swung open, the mountain of a man's stormy grey eyes darkened when he saw Naruto and summarily closed peacefully when the boy raised his left hand, pointer and middle finger jutting out from the fist, and poked his forehead in a blaze of speed.

"_Sleep."_

The man swayed from side to side, then the boy bent forward and caught him on his back, grunting under the weight.

The girl opened her mouth to scream but the boy, adjusting the weight on his back and hefting the father up onto his shoulder with only one arm, said. "He's just sleeping." True to his words, the man started snoring, a deep, rumbling sound that felt like a landslide on his back. The girl looked astonished at the display, surprised a boy with a broken arm could still carry one as large as her father and also that he had put him to sleep with one muttered word and a jab to the face. "_Disorientation genjutsu_ applied straight to the brain can induce dizziness and cause sleep within point five seconds, against casting the _Disorientation genjutsu_ from a distance, which will just cause mild dizziness and nausea." he said, answering her unvoiced question. Her mind tried to wrap itself around what he had just said. The thing with illusions was that, so as not to be detected, they had to be cast while the user touched the target. The chakra control needed to disorientate and maintain a near invisible chakra presence was outstanding, and the civilian girl wouldn't really get that point. "Where's his room?"

She numbly led him to the room next to hers and Naruto dropped the man into his bed.

"Trust me, he'll be fine. He'll be a bit light-headed in the morning. That's all."

"…Ok." She conceded, after checking his breathing, his pulse and confirming again with his loud snores. Kasi covered her father with a warm blanket and closed his bedroom door with a faint _click_.

She led the way back into her room and shut the door, locking it. Her grey eyes watched the boy slid back into the chair, cautious. "Are you a ninja or-or are you an engineer? Which is it? Cuz I-I'm confused."

"I'm some kid that wants to find some peace of mind in a world that doesn't want to give him peace of mind."

"That doesn't even make sense!"

He grinned at her. "I know." He spared a look at what she had done with the magnet and then said. "Can I borrow your phone?"

She practically chucked it at him, irritated. "Take it, I don't care anymore." Interest flooded into her orbs when his left fingers tapped the screen, sliding and swiping with masterful ease. "What are you doing this time?"

He tried to think of how to explain it to her. "I'm…upgrading your phones security. If Kumo technicians hack into it, they would be diverted to a false phone."

"Why?"

"Because I'm bored and your phone has porn in it."

She dove at him, trying to snatch away her phone from his grasp. "I don't have porn!"

He raised the phone away from her insistent hand, still tapping without looking. "I didn't even need to hack into your phone to know. It's all over your face." He wasn't offended at the girl's apparent sexual curiosity but rather he was deeply amused; her perversions weren't trained on him but rather, _apparently_, on a popular Fire country porn actress named Yugi. Her mortification was endearing.

"Gimme it!"

He laughed and pushed her away with his right foot, tinkering with her phone for a few more seconds before he tossed it back to her. "I also scrubbed your selfie camera. Don't want anyone to watch you while you're doing yourself."

If her face turned anymore red, Naruto would have felt concerned. Steam blasted from her ears as she curled up into herself, hugging the phone, and her shame, with all her might.

"I read it's natural for teens to be curious." Naruto snorted, tumbling into another belly laugh.

The dark skinned girl silently glared at him, swivelled around and stomped to the magnet she was building. She had had more than enough awkward embarrassments and revelations from this…this…this _boy_ for one night.

"Ignoring me huh?" he asked with a teasing smile. Kasi puffed out her red cheeks and nodded once. "That's fine…I know Yugi, y'know." Her head could not snap up any faster. He looked away, slyly buffing his left fingernails on his shirt. "I used to bartend for her brothel…but that's a long time ago, in a past life. Know what I mean?" he saw the war of indecision on her face, so he said, frankly and with a twinkle in his eyes. "I'm _not_ going to set up a meeting with you two."

"Why not?" she spat before she could cover he mouth with her hands.

"You're fifteen."

"So?"

"You're fifteen." He repeated. "End of discussion."

Her head lowered again, puffing out her cheeks and rigidly building Naruto's magnet. She grumbled. "Well that's stupid. Why'd you even say that if your not going to help me out?"

"Because I'm bored."

"Pshh whatever."

"Need any pointers?"

"No."

He settled back in the chair and his mind went back to a memory from a few hours ago

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Flashback: five hours, thirty minutes ago_

_04:39PM_

_Naruto's mountain base_

Konan collapsed onto her side, passed out, and Naruto scoffed.

"So much for being an angel." Konan's power level was about as equal to Orochimaru's and Itachi's, yet she couldn't handle her brain being opened and copied. He didn't even alter her memories. Maybe she was tired out from the futile resistance she was making, trying to muddle memories and tangle her thoughts. It was a sad attempt because her own chakra was rebelling against her but Naruto wo0uld give her some credit; she had provided a mild hindrance.

A spy drone was already on its way to Ame.

The sensor tied to the robot informed him that it was now five miles out of Kumogakure, proving that robots devoid of seals could fly to and fro over the technical village, as long as the security cameras were controlled by Naruto. The drone was carrying with it Konan's and the others Akatsuki ring and an voice message.

_Your assassination attempt on me has failed._

_Only Zetsu remains but I will have his head soon enough._

_You can have your rings; I don't think they'll need them anymore._

_Meet me in my Demon country hideout in two days. We both know you know where I'm talking about. Come with your paths and without the intention to attack or harm. If you come any sooner or any later then I'll turn Konan into a brainless vegetable, so much so that not even your rinnegan can revive her._

_We both know I can do it._

_If you want to try me, then I dare you to come._

_Harming this messenger is equal to harming me. Do so and you'll be picking up pieces of Konan for centuries._

He would sell the carcasses of the Akatsuki on a later date.

Naruto stomped to Mikoto and sat her up against the wall, hogtied like Konan. He looked at the unconscious woman for a moment and said. "Your turn, I guess." Like with the other two, he placed his left gloved hand on her head and combined both sound and vibrations specific to Mikoto's chakra core, unlocking her tenketsu and destabilizing her core, thereby opening up her mind to Naruto's computer goggles when it processed the response to the sound and vibration. His forehead crinkled at the resistance. "Strange…"

Her chakra was fighting against her chakra, and the offending chakra was winning. Typical signs of a person being under a genjutsu except one cannot place an illusion on oneself, it just didn't make sense. Then he remembered that Ai had not just deflected her evolved sharingan illusion but deflected it.

"That has to be why…I think…"

He focused into his goggles and lessened the power of his photon beam even more, experimentally trickling his foreign chakra into her body, one of the ways to dispel a genjutsu. The warring chakra gave way for him but went back at their squabble once his chakra passed them. The vibrations and sounds loosened up Mikoto's chakra and his own chakra eased open the gates ever so cautiously.

The woman's brain bloomed over his head but…it was…different.

Different like not how a human mind should look.

There were two presences in her body, one a cool shade of blue and the other toxic red. They were meshed together in a combination of blazing numbers. He recognized the red mind, so much so he almost let go of her head in surprise. He pressed harder and turned the hologram to the merging side of the two minds.

The Tsukoyomi, Naruto recalled, played before his very eyes.

_**Mikoto Uchiha's POV (Warning: Graphic sexual assault)**_

_Mikoto had never known such torment._

_Not in her many years of being successful Kunoichi._

"_Pyyyyeeeeee!" she cried, screaming as her insides were pushed aside by the ravaging member. "Pyyeeeeeee! Ssshhhhtapppppp!" one massive phallus pushed against her clenched shut butthole and her eyes bugged out. A scream ripped from her lungs as the giant member shot its way into her body, going in and out in tandem with the one in her womanhood. Seven foot tall, green skinned, potbellied, beady eyed monsters-ogres-grunted and snorted, surrounding her in all sides, naked as the day they were manifested and holding out their junk to her face and hands, savagely jerking off. They waited for the two in both of her lower holes to finish but grew impatient, forcing her hands to service them and her mouth to perform the impossible task of servicing each and all with her throat. "GghhnggnnggH!"_

_This punishment was excruciating._

_Torn open after hours of being thrown around and crudely mended, only to be skewered to pieces._

_Not even for a single second had they given her respite, or breathing space._

_The very second she landed in the rebounded illusion, tied down onto a tattered bed that stank of dead rats, human saliva and sweat, in a place that had only grey skies and cracked, brown ground, she had been swarmed by these foul looking and smelling monsters and pummelled through every possible hole in her body._

_A scream ripped from her lungs when two bulbous cocks rammed into her small, weeping womanhood, the one shredding her arsehole went on like nothing had ever happened, with the two forcing her hands to jerk them off and her poor throat stretched well past its limit. They removed their fat, puss ridden hands from hers and her body betrayed her by pumping their members as hard as her weak arms could, groaning in pain as the cocks in her lady part released their seed and slipped out, the ogres panting with exertion. Two more found their way in, somehow, and without pause, and banged into her with the fervour of an adrenaline pumped rabbit._

_Tears poured down her eyes as she heard a chilling _rrrrrrippppp!

_She glanced down and saw that her stomach, from her pussy lips to her navel, had torn open._

_Again._

_The monsters angrily bashed her bleeding abdomen, enraged that their members had fallen out, and the tear fixed itself again, like the zipper of a bag closing up. They grunted and grumbled approvingly and went into her again, this time two in her backdoor and two in her front, _somehow_ making it work._

_Her voice failed her, drowned under the flood of monster spunk rushing down her throat._

_The creature removed his massive part, a part of her mind wondered how she was able to take it all down her mouth and another wondered why she even cared anymore. Her eyes found the strength to bug out when another approached her, warbling orders that made the other ogres defer to him, all except those mercilessly pounding away at her lower half. The new ogre was giant, and that was saying something. Compared to the others, it was a mountain while they were hills. It tore off its furry loincloth and she wailed, two of her front teeth and both of her canines missing, shoved down her throat by the last fifteenth ogre or so._

"_Waayyyyytttt…Nooo…mer…sheyyyyyyy…"_

_It ignored her cries and thrust into her mouth, an act that threw the other four going at it in her lower half away a good ten feet._

_A pair of red eyes closed and looked away, feeling an odd satisfaction welling in his stomach._

_**Normal POV (You can look now)**_

Mind raped, that was the best way to describe what was happening to her. He watched for only half a minute before he went back to the red brain, prodding it for any kind of response and immediately it changed to a docile grey-green, moving into his digital touch like an over eager dog would to an owner. The illusion kept playing in her head while he cut Ai from Mikoto's mind and saved the super computers sentient mind into his spare goggles memory banks; he couldn't very well paste his friend into the spare because there was already a presence within the goggles. The goggles would crash and he would not only lose Ai again but also the new, spare computer, which was much less sophisticated, far from a super computer but acceptably competent in handling Naruto's matters.

He surfed through Mikoto's mind, after copying it all, and read that the Tsukoyomi was an illusion that made the victim suffer what felt like seventy two hours of torture but in reality it was mere minutes.

She deserved her torture.

He wiped out her memory, cleaning every nook and cranny of her brain leaving her only the awareness of who she was and what was going to happen to her, merely surface memories of the past thirteen years. Naruto released his grip on her head and waved his hand to her; his _Gamma Fire_ combat drone hovered to its master with a muted buzz and carried the woman up into the air, bridal style between its surprisingly sturdy arms.

The robot was ordered to drop the brainless woman a five hundred miles above the village, directly above the Hokage's mansion. It would be sudden and unexpected because he had not just cleared her brain of almost everything but he deactivated her chakra. She would know see her death coming as she fell and she wouldn't be able to do anything.

Another voice message on the robot.

_Leave me alone!_

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Flashback end_

The drone would be a few more minutes to Konoha by now.

It was more than she ever deserved. He could have very well sold her to the Iwa black market as a slave, a fate globally known to be much, much, _much_ worse than death. Naruto wanted to only use her as a message to his parents, as well as to all of Konoha.

Kasi looked up at him with her eyebrows furrowed in what could pass off as a worry, still irked at him. "You ok?"

"I'm fine, just thinking about something?"

"…Wanna tell me?"

He studied her for a second, how her eyes fleetingly looked up into his every once in a while before going back down to assembling the last parts of the magnet. He stood up and walked to her, kneeling down on the other side of the fairly large magnet. She flinched and he sighed. "I'm not going to hurt you, you know."

"I know." She said, and he saw that she meant it. "I'm not used to sitting this close to a boy close to my age."

"What about Omoi?"

She wasn't even surprised he knew about him. "Cousin Omoi is twelve and he's my _cousin_. He doesn't count." He shrugged and looked up at his instructions.

"Seems all you needed were the instructions." She hadn't once asked him to explain something to her. It was her turn to shrug, keeping her eyes firmly down as she screwed down a thin sheet of metal onto the delicate part of the magnet, like the illustration. "You didn't need my help with your homework…did you…?" he looked at her knowingly and she pouted in silence, still working. He drew out her name playfully. "Kasi~"

"Fine." she dropped the screwdriver and picked up a switch Naruto had invented to turn on and off the magnet remotely. She began attaching the necessary wires to the switch, looking to the instruction, the illustration and briefly at him. Her hands moved in a flurry. "I wanted us to hang out. You seemed smart."

"I'm not smart anymore?"

"No, you're _smarter_. Back then you were this university graduate that majored in engineering, now your some kind of…a-a-a super genius. Tech gloves, tech boots, robot hover boards, a freaking super computer, and I bet your filthy stinking rich…" She kept her eyes down, her shoulders heaved out a sigh and she paused. "_Way_ out of my league now."

"Don't belittle yourself, Kasi. I won't be here if I didn't think you could do this. _You're_ smart."

She scoffed. "Pshh, thanks, I guess."

He exhaled with a small frown, then said. "My real name is Naruto."

Her eyes glinted as she looked up at him. "I know."

"For how long?"

"Since that fight in front of the store."

"And you didn't tell anyone. Why?"

"You had to have your reasons for running away. Plus…I'm not stupid. I know what they'll do to you if they catch you."

"…Thanks."

She smiled at him, warmly, and nodded. "Don't mention it." she put in the finishing touches and sat back on her knees, her fists on her hip. "Done." She made to lift it onto the hover board, knowing very well that it weighed up to three times her body weight.

"Don't worry about that." Naruto held out his left hand and the gloves zipped into place, arming itself and fully powering on. He bent down and carried the human sized magnet, gently dropping it onto the hover board. "Take it to Demon country."

The flying tech board whizzed out of the window and Naruto unarmed his left glove. The girl didn't seem shocked at the feat of strength, not after he had carried her father to bed _without_ the glove. He dug into his pocket and held out four bank cards to her-Banks of Lightning, Darkness, Fire and Waterfall.

"I programmed them to accept any pin you type. Try not to lose them."

She plucked out one, Bank of Waterfall, and pushed the rest back to him. "One will be fine. I won't even know how to spend it but I'll find a way."

"I owe you much more than money, Kasi. Thank you for your help." He stood back and bowed deeply to her. Her blush came back in full force and she pushed him to straighten up.

"It was really nothing, Naruto."

He looked at her, hesitant, then he said. "My contact info is in your phone, under _Kyohi_. Don't hesitate to call me if you need anything. And I mean _anything_; money, tutoring, advice, someone to talk to, I really don't mind."

She laughed a little and gave him a slight smile. "I will." She bent down and picked up his holo-disk.

He shook his head. "You can keep it. When I upgrade its model then I'll send a better version to you."

"But what if someone steals it?"

"They'll wish they never stole it."

_Bleep! Bleep! Bleep!_

He stalked to the computer and gathered his things; removing the cord in his goggles and fixing the visor, taking out the flashdrive and tossing it into his backpack with the black cord and the holo-disk. He shut down the computer and tapped the screen on his goggles one.

_Full system reboot required. Approximately six hours._

He fixed the goggles onto his forehead as the super computer started rebooting. He zipped up his back and slung it onto his back as best as he could. Kasi came over and helped him slid his left hand through the left strap.

"Where will you be going?"

"Demon country."

"To do what?"

"Launch a rocket into space."

He said it so candidly, so frankly, that she didn't look unbelieving. She stopped being surprised a while ago. "And after that?"

"Off the continent." He walked to the window and his sneakers slowly changed into his combat boots, arming themselves. The silver plates crept up and stopped under his knees, under his pants. "Find an island and spend the rest of my life in solitude."

"That's…depressing."

He smiled at her and poked her forehead. "Life is depressing."

He sat down on her window and flung his legs to the other side, his boots burst with soft white energy, keeping him balanced outside in the air. Cleaning drones in his mountain base began packing up his things, chargers with his weapons in them clumped together, as if magnetically attracted, and flew off into the night, followed soon after by the compacted boxes that were his Combat and Suicide drones. All of his controlled by his chakra, though still near invisible to natural sensors. The dead bodies and the unconscious Angel of Ame were flown to Demon country as well. Kasi leaned out of the window, marvelled by his tech boots.

"I was never here." He waved to her with a broad smile. "Goodnight, Kasi." He whizzed off in a blast of air, leaving her to wave at nothing but the odourless white smoke he left in his wake.

"Goodnight…Naruto…"

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Three days later_

_Naruto's Cliffside hideout_

_Demon country_

Dark rinnegan eyes stared at the boys turned back with unhidden disdain. The waves crashed and smashed into the shores of his Cliffside hideout. Pein didn't see his serene smile as he watched the landscape of water thrash and smash against the rocks, never truly able to reach him. The thunderstorm had subsided to a low, almost casual drizzle.

The view was…nice.

"Where is Konan?" the deva path asked, the other paths standing to its side.

After a charged silence, Naruto said. "Somewhere _relatively_ safe." He tossed the Akatsuki ring over his shoulder; the corpse caught the tiny object. Naruto had also taken the privilege of nullifying all the seals on her person, so no tracking seal could find her. "I want us to…talk…Nagato."

The boy looked over his shoulder with a secret smile.

"About Konan's safety."

**Authors note**

**I wanted to say more but I feel like I should end it here.**

**What did you think? This is my longest chapter for this story. I'm effing tired.**

**Drop a review, would you so kindly. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you :)**

**Foy.**


	13. Chapter 13

**Wassssssssap**

**HUGE shout out to Dawood Saqlain (writing and reading stories is one of the ways I stay sane in these trying times. Thanks for the review!), PinkiePieParty122894 (thank you), anthonym3, TheForgottenSuns75 (thank you very much!), Spark681, Cboylan, youflesh840 (I appreciate it, dude. Thank you), TheKing91, saiyan prince1, lord 7th, Draconspire (thank you so much) and BigY1308 (thanks for reading, man). You're all fantastic people :)**

**This chapter is short. Bear with me.**

**Warning…this chapter contains a jarring way to die.**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 13

_**Flashback: When Alpha Fire and Mikoto got to Konoha**_

"_Naruto…I'm so sorry…please…forgive me…"_

_Back in Kumo, Naruto's goggles alerted him that his fire drone had reached the Leaf and had reached the height it had been commanded to achieve. He tuned in to the robots eyes, emotionlessly watching as the person that held him in her belly for nine good months for her best friend begged for her life, mentally and physically too weak to put up any real struggle._

_Her coal black eyes looked at him imploringly, staring into the burning red orbs of the robot and knowing that it transmitted right back to the boy at real-time. The woman was not bound by ropes and her mouth wasn't covered by a gag or duct tape but she couldn't move because her chakra had been sealed by a strong Steam Scorpion Nerve Strike and her voice was weak from being mind raped over and over again by ogres._

_Naruto looked at her, stared at her for five long minutes, then he said._

"_Drop her."_

_His eyes stared at her as she wordlessly fell; her wide black eyes looked back at him, surprised that he had gone through with his promise. His dark eyes didn't shake at her betrayed eyes, staring after her without so much as an expression._

_The world moved slowly for both of them; Mikoto falling and Naruto watching her fall. The wind thrashed violently against her shinobi gear, stripped down of all her weapons, and her long black hair flapped in the wind, framing her face._

_Her mouth opened to scream but no sound came._

_On the ground, Sakura and Ino exited from the grocery store, carrying a bag of fresh cabbages, onions, leaks and tomatoes. They saw something blotting out some of the sun's light and looked up, squinting._

_A scream tore from the pink haired girls lips and Ino's hand flew to her mouth._

_The rest of the village was just a bit slower to realize what the horrified eleven year olds were looking at._

_Mikoto landed before the Hokage's mansion with a wet smack and a ground shaking crash, knocking most off their feet and making the villages alarm wail through the air. The ninjas converged on the small crater the woman was in, bent and broken, dismantled like a discarded ragdoll. The rest looked up to see who or what had dropped the Uchiha clan head from the sky, only seeing a black spot in the clear blue sky._

_Naruto tapped the side of his goggles and the drone delivered the second part of his message._

"LEAVE ME ALONE!"

_Kushina shoved aside the ninjas before and fell on her knees beside her dead best friends broken and twisted form; her arms and fingers bent in the wrong direction and her legs and toes facing wrong angles. Her head was swivelled all the way around, leaving her neck twisted and her spine snapped. The back of her head was cracked open, seeping with blood and brain matter. Her tongue laid somewhere to her left, chomped off on impact with the ground, and one of her eyes had exploded from the pressure of the fall. _

"_Mikoto!" the redhead howled, grabbing the dead woman by her shirt and pushing her face into her fallen friends neck, bawling pitifully. The other ninjas stepped back respectfully and turned away, giving the mourning woman some manner of privacy. "Mikoto!" she screamed again, her body trembling as hot tears rolled out of her eyes. They poured and poured like a broken tap, unable to put the stopper on her emotions like a good ninja. "Ahhhhhhhhhh…AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"_

_Kushina had been friends with Mikoto from the very their first day of the Academy. The Uchiha was more of a follower but they nonetheless flowed so well with each other that they were often confused as twins, though of opposite temperament and different great clans. Their thoughts were almost the same and they had even been in a friendly competition on who could bag Minato first. If not for the minor fact that it wouldn't be seen in favourable light back in the day, they would have happily gotten married to each other._

"_Mikoto no! AHHHHHH! AHHHHHHHHH!"_

_A pair of hands pulled her off the corpse and she immediately turned in his arms, bathing in his warmth. Minato's arms wrapped his wife up in the strongest, firmest embrace and the woman fisted his coat, crying loudly into his chest. He could feel a piece of her heart chip away._

_Only Naruto could fix her now._

"_We've almost got him, Kushi." He whispered, a solemn promise that had the woman gradually reduce her screaming into quiet whimpers. "In Kumo, we can't get in for obvious reasons…_but_…we'll wait for him to come out. I'll personally bring him back."_

_She looked up at him with watery purple eyes, large and dilated, sniffing cutely. "Promise…?"_

_He beamed at her, a halo of light shining from his face and warming a cold part of her soul. "Promise."_

_**Flashback end**_

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Some hours after leaving Kasi's room_

Naruto touched down in Demon country and breathed out, tired. Sure, flying was a faster means of transportation, much faster than by carriage or by train, but he was using his chakra, carefully processed into his boots, to fly. He didn't have seemingly endless chakra like his mother.

"Get to work building the rocket, let me know when you're done. Then I'll personally install the satellite."

His cleaning drones bustled around, bearing blue burning torches, hammers, screws and screwdrivers and chattering with apparent excitement at the command. Some flew out of the base with Naruto's rocket tank and the thrusters'-six massive constructions that would spew out dark fire as it propelled the whole ship into space-, others guided five more as they hefted up the body-comprising of three segments-of the rocket, leading them carefully to the assembled tank and thrusters' and welding it in place, though the very top was left open for the satellite to be placed in. Naruto wasn't too worried the drizzle of the Demon country's receding storm would damage the rocket, even as the robots sparked and fizzed at the thrusters'.

The rocket was divided into four parts; the thrusters', the three segmented body and the top. The satellite would be kept in the top segment while the function of the two other segments was to insulate the heat from the thrusters' from reaching the delicate wiring of the satellite, serving also as the control centre that would navigate the rocket off earth and into orbit, before they would all separate into the void of space, leaving the fully operational satellite to orbit around the earth, solely hovering over the elemental nations but still bearing the sensory power to watch the whole world, even the other side of the planet.

He watched his robots bring together his rocket, trying to push down the nervousness he had been feeling since leaving Kasi's room.

'_This is finally going to happen.'_ He thought, unable to hide the smile cracking onto his face. _'In a few days, I'll have my Hyper Sight blast off. I'll find my island and it'll watch my back from space.'_

Saying that Naruto was weaponizing his Hyper Sight would be an understatement.

Small alarm bells rang in his head and his head turned to the right, holding up his left hand and ready to shoot a photon beam at the incoming threat.

The eagle squawked, visibly offended that the person he had been sent to was about to blast him out of the sky. It skirted over Naruto, flapping its wings heavily to prevent the drizzle from bringing him down, clenching the message scroll in his talons. Naruto's eyes saw the Demon country Daimyo's seal on the birds collar and lowered his hand, holding out his left hand for the bird to perch on. The bird _cawed_ again and Naruto rolled his eyes when it refused to alight on his offered wrist, choosing to drop the message and fly away as quickly as possible.

He shrugged and held the scroll out with his left hand.

_Dear Naruto,_

_I know you said I shouldn't contact you but I can't help myself._

_Welcome back to Demon country, Naruto. I hope your time away was fruitful. I wanted to warn you that a few Konoha ninjas enquired about you this morning and have asked me to not stand in their way of your retrieval. I, of course, told them that even if you were within my borders, you are under protection through the _Demon country Daimyo's seal_. Asylum, so to speak. If they found you in my country they are to leave you be else force my hand to declare any attack within my border an act of terrorism from a foreign nation. Demon country will have the _Right of Retribution_ if you are attacked while under asylum. I will ensure I take a pound of flesh from Fire country in your honour._

_The Leaf ninjas are out of my country now._

_I hope you take this as my apology for my impolite words the other day. I am truly sorry._

_I've got your back, Naruto._

_Your biggest fan,_

_Shion._

Naruto stuffed the letter into his pocket and hummed. A reconnaissance robot flew up to him, patiently hovering before him.

"Thank you for your help, Lady Shion. I am in your debt. I hope it doesn't reach the extent of quarrelling with Fire country. You don't have to worry about that, I will be out of your hands in a few days. Again, thank you for your protection." He jerked his head to the right, roughly in the direction of the daimyos palace, and the spy bot flew away to deliver the voice message.

Parts of his satellite were built separately and had still not fully assembled and Naruto couldn't do that in his state. He couldn't very well leave the work to his cleaning robots; it was a specialized task that their grunt work specialty wouldn't be able to accomplish with approvable finesse. The only possible way for them to get the job done was if Ai was controlling them.

_Four hours remaining._

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Three days later_

The day came that he was ready.

Everything he could build and assembled was ready.

The rocket was ready.

The satellite was installed.

The rocket fuel was pumped in.

The satellite was fully operational, though still offline for obvious reasons.

_Everything_ was ready…but the weather.

Rain poured in light showers and light blue lightning crackled through the sky after low rumbles of thunder. It was far from the terrible cyclone that had rolled through the country, yes, that was undeniable, but Naruto didn't not want to launch his rocket and have lightning scramble the connection between his goggles and the satellite; the rain was too light to cause much of a nuisance so he didn't take it into mind. The rocket, standing in all its red, black and white painted glory, steaming from its latest engine test and pointing to the heaven, its future destination, stood close to the edge of the cliff on a solid platform that both prevented it from toppling off the cliff into the sea and also held down the rocket firmly. A small handful of spy drones whirled around the magnificent piece of machinery, running through preliminary checks and cleaning robots buffed it top to bottom, giving it a glorious shine with wax.

By Ai's forecast, the lightning would stop completely for another month or so by the next day.

In spite of the ground breaking technology Naruto had designed and invented on his own, he didn't have the equipment to actually control the weather.

That thought made the currently grey-blonde haired teen scoff.

Knowing him, if he got bored enough, he would begin designing and inventing in a few years after he had run out of things to invent.

For now he enjoyed the view, even as Ai muttered.

"_Pein has arrived, boss."_

Dark rinnegan eyes stared at the boys turned back with unhidden disdain. The waves crashed and smashed into the shores of his Cliffside hideout. Pein didn't see his serene smile as he watched the landscape of water thrash and smash against the rocks, never truly able to reach him. The thunderstorm had subsided to a low, almost casual drizzle.

The view was…nice.

"Where is Konan?" the deva path asked, the other paths standing to its side.

After a charged silence, Naruto said. "Somewhere relatively safe." He tossed the Akatsuki ring over his shoulder; the corpse caught the tiny object. Naruto had also taken the privilege of nullifying all the seals on her person, so no tracking seal could find her. "I want us to…talk…Nagato."

The boy looked over his shoulder with a secret smile.

"About Konan's safety."

Water crashed at the far bottom of the cliff and lifted up, breezing cool droplets onto the boy's face. He closed his eyes and savoured the feeling; his broken arm was now in a white cast and a sling, under a thick dark red coat. The cast itched like hell most of the time but now that the air was cool and the breeze was soft and caressing, the scratchiness fled him.

He had to thank Hino again for helping him with his cast; Ai couldn't be gentle enough to place it on his arm. A red scrawling signature was drawn on his arm, signed further with a pair of cat ears and whiskers.

There was a small tug on the back of his coat and he tutted, shaking his head. "Don't do that, Nagato. Your friends life is literally in my hands; rinnegan or not, when she becomes a vegetable, sliced, diced and sold into the Darkness black market for parts, you will never be able to resurrect her." He smiled faintly as he sensed the rage of the rinnegan holder, followed by the tugging sensation reducing till he was fully released. "Good…good…"

"Face me, child. Address me with the respect I deserve." The deva path said in a deep, intimidating voice, clenching his fists hard enough to crack his knuckles.

"If I were you, old man, I'd drop the pride and listen to what I have to say." He shook his head again when Pein barely got a handle on his wild, erratic Uzumaki chakra. "It's this very same temper of yours that cost you your precious Akatsuki." The boy finally turned to the orange haired leader of the Paths of Pein and narrowed his eyes, far from afraid. "Get over it. You came after my head, you lost seven good S ranks and you're going to lose your eighth if you don't calm the fuck down."

"I don't know how you did it, boy." Pein spat hatefully, detesting the young inventor more than any other person on the planet. More than Hanzo, more than Danzo, more than Jiraiya and more than Minato. He didn't need to be reminded that Naruto had finished off his Akatsuki with a broken arm and sprained muscles. "I warn you not to push me-"

Naruto poked his temple with his left pointer finger, saying. "I have Konan's memories and that includes the ones about your rinnegan." He saw the deva path masterfully hold down his surprise. "You confided in her everything, old man, and now I know _everything_." He walked up to Nagato, closing the distance at a leisurely pace. Naruto looked Pein dead in the eyes and whispered. "If you want to try your luck…compare how fast you can kill me to how fast I can have Konan killed…do so." Naruto dared, his red eyes boring a deep hole in the Kage's eyes. The insanity in the boys eyes and the potent amount of trauma the boy had been through cut from his eyes and dug deep into the old man's soul, all the way back in Ame. "If you think you can yank out my soul…or force me to tell the truth with that freaky _King of Hell_…go ahead…but let me warn you, _again_."

He stepped closer and Nagato took a precautionary step back, subtly preparing himself in case Naruto attacked. The other paths warily looked on.

"If you harm me…_in any way_…not even the Shinigami would know where to find her soul…" he motioned between Pein and himself with his good hand. "Do we have an understanding…?"

The corpse clenched his teeth powerfully and hissed, submitting to the greater insanity before him. "…Yes…"

Naruto cracked a small grin. "Cool." He placed a firm hand on the deva path's shoulder, patting it twice. The path looked at his shoulder with narrowed, seething purple ringed eyes, silently thinking of the ways he was going to murder the boy once he got his best friend back. "I need you to do something for me before you get Konan back."

"What?"

"For someone like you, it should be really simple."

The man mutely waited for the boy to go on. Naruto gave a slanted smile, one between a smile and a frown, and said.

"I want you to kill my parents, Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki." A cleaning robot gave him his wallet and his mobile phone, both of which he stored in the pockets inside the coat. The last item he collected from the robot was a side bag. "When you get that done, I'll fly Konan to Ame, nice and safe."

"How do I know you're not lying?"

"That's the thing," Naruto said, adjusting the bag and raising an eyebrow. "You don't."

"You're trying you're like, brat."

"I'm aware."

Pein stepped aside as Naruto walked past him, towards Demon country market. He had a few things he wanted to buy so that he could have them on hand when he found a suitable island. He wanted to go there as slowly and without stress.

On a boat.

That idea appealed to him greatly.

'_I've never sailed before…might be a nice experience…'_ he thought, already running through designs and schematics on the boat he was no doubt going to build.

"What of Konoha?" Pein asked, causing the boy to stop and look over his shoulder with a raised eyebrow.

"What about Konoha?"

"Uzumaki Kushina and Namikaze Minato are both double S rank. I cannot be ranked. No matter how you think about it, if I fight them in Konoha, the village would turn into rubble."

"I know about your hate for Konoha, Pein." Naruto stated factedly.

"…Well?"

"Do whatever you have to do. I want them dead." He could practically feel the joy radiating off the paths. "Get going."

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_A few minutes_

_The Hokage's office_

_Konohagakure no Sato_

The door to the most powerful ninja in the Hidden Leaf, and arguably the whole world, blew open and the deva and human path walked in briskly, stopping a few steps into the room and narrowing their eyes at the person sitting on the desk.

Kushina, wearing her full combat uniform, crossed her right leg over her left and looked at the intruder with a coy smirk.

The alarms of the village were screaming from outside the village as the other paths laid waste to the village and its forces, indiscriminately attacking anything that moved.

The woman swept her red hair, tied into a messy pony tail that reached her lower back, and said. "My husband isn't on seat at the moment." She hopped off the desk and skipped forward two steps, an action that made the deva paths fingers twitch, ready to crush the Uzumaki powerhouse into paste. "You'll have to make do with me."

Kushina Uzumaki grinned cattishly and blurred to the deva path, thousands of golden chains exploding from her back and waving in the air like sentient tentacles.

"Try not to die so quickly, hmmm~"

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_That same moment_

_General Market_

_Demon country_

Naruto's bent down on one knee, his eyebrows peered into a five year old child's teary eyes and smirked. "Lemme show you a magic trick."

The boy's eyes brightened, forgetting what he had been crying about and nodded quickly.

The inventor shifted his side bag to his right side and brought out a single one ryu coin from his left pocket with his left hand. He held it up for the child to see, who was utterly enraptured and completely attentive to the older boy. Naruto rolled his wrist and the coin was gone, the boy's eyes widened in wonder and Naruto's left hand flicked to the child's ear, retrieving the coin, flipping it with his thumb and catching it in the palm of his hand, close his hand, rolled his wrist again and showed his empty hand to the boy. Naruto smiled when the child looked around himself for any sign of the coin, stopping when the grey-yellow haired stranger held up his pointer finger for his attention. The thirteen year old tapped the child's forehead and tapped his nose, an action that had the little boy giggle, and flicked his hand, holding the silver coin between his pointer and middle finger. It was really all a trick he used to store large amount of weapons on his person and bring them out without much effort or thought.

He weaved the coin through his left fingers, making sure to keep his broken arm hidden under his dark blue coat.

He said. "Want to try it?"

"Yes!"

Naruto smiled slightly and held out the coin to the boy with his index and middle finger. "Hold out your hands." the child did so and Naruto dropped the coin into the boy's pudgy left hand, placing the right over the left. At this point, more than a few people were watching the teen perform the simple coin tricks. Sure ninjas knew how to breathe fire and walk on water, not to talk of sealing away tremendous amount of stuff into scrawled drawings, but it couldn't compare to the wonder of watching one as young as Naruto make a coin appear and disappear without expelling chakra at all. "Concentrate on the coin." The boy closed his eyes and his forehead crinkled with childish focus, his body basically humming with energy. "Open your hand."

The coin was gone.

Naruto chuckled under his breath at the gasp of surprise from the crowd behind him and at the little boys wonder.

"Where'd di go?"

"Try it again."

The child eagerly closed and opened his hands and the coin sat in his left palm. Naruto plucked the coin from the child's shaking hands and blew at it, it disappeared into thin air yet again and the inventor flicked his hand behind the child's other ear, retrieving it.

"Touji!"

"Mama!" the child spun to his name and ran into his mother's arms. Naruto had found him crying on the pavement, unable to find his mother in the bustling cluster of people it he market; it was populated because that was a special market day for the people of Demon country. Naruto had finished his shopping for that day, so he kept the child company until his mother came back to where she lost her child, or for the next ten minutes, when he would take the boy to any ninja on guard. "I did magic, mama!"

The worried woman looked up and looked back down at her child, confused. "Magic?"

The child spun around and his enthusiasm dimmed slightly when he didn't see who had been showing him magic. The crowd of people also seemed mystified that the teen had vanished from their midst without so much as making noise. They all collectively shrugged at the woman's silent question. "He wis…righ…here…"

Naruto left the small crowd and ducked into a food stand, sliding onto a bar stool and lifting one finger. "Beef ramen and orange juice, please."

"Right away." One of the four chefs behind the bar said and began preparing Naruto's ramen. Naruto felt more carefree in Demon country now that he was officially under the country's protection. Not that he lied to himself that no one would attack him in Demon country borders but that there would be _actual_ consequences if that happened. There would be political and economic consequences to the attacking country, whether or not it was a hidden village that acted on their own volition instead of the whole country. It would have to do for now until he sailed off the continent. The low murmurs of the patrons in the fairly popular food stand floated around and the boy dropped his side bag onto the ground, running a tired hand through his mixed hair; he quite liked the combination of his natural sunny blonde hair and highlights of grey mixed here and there. He smiled fleetingly at the people to his right, fellow teens who were on break from their duties as a genin and spending it with a bowl of udon and soba, the three were probably all teammates. They nodded back respectfully and went back to talking among themselves.

At this point nearly everyone knew who he was but no one would go against the Daimyos decree, which stated that if they aided and abated the attack on Naruto's person in any way then they would spend fifty years on prison. The daimyo was both the spiritual and political head of the country, her words were considered the words of Yami herself and her actions were seen as mirror images of what Yami would do, so they obeyed without question.

Someone sat to Naruto's right and the hair on the back of his neck stood up.

"Nice 'magic' show, son." Minato said and Naruto slowly turned his head to him, his neck creaking, stiff. His eyes were wide and he gulped. His father looked more like him than his birth mother, Mikoto; shining, sunny, spikey blonde hair, soft features that would have looked feminine if they didn't notice the man's broad shoulders, strong build. Minato's white and red flamed haori fluttered as he sat down properly, looking at his son with a smile.

Naruto silently looked up at the man, the goggles on his forehead working on overtime to summon the drones from his Cliffside base and call up his gloves. The man could guess as much, seeing as the boy subtly shifted his legs to face the bar, propping his feet up against the vertical base.

"I wonder though…how were you able to blow away the coin?" Minato asked with a sharp smirk, his crystal blue eyes looking deep into his child's bright purple orbs.

"A magician and his secrets." Naruto answered in a quiet voice, simpering with bubbling anger. He felt wrath build up from the pit of his stomach and surge upwards past his chest and threatening to spill out of his mouth, willing to burn the man down with his hellfire. But he didn't do that. He only whispered, flicking his eyes to the patrons of the food stand, unaware of the growing tension between father and son. "Do you want to do this here…or somewhere less…congested…?"

The man chuckled and answered. "How about in Konoha?" the multibillionaire cocked his head to the side and gave his silently mad boy a patronizing smile. "Kushina should be just about done with that guy you sent to kill us."

They were gone in a yellow flash.

**Next time on ****Redlights**

_Naruto felt her chakra presence wash over him in overbearing waves before he even heard her voice._

"_Naru-baby!" she called and his body froze, standing ramrod in the centre of the decimation caused by his own hand. "I missed you, honey!"_

_Petrified._

_He felt a hand on his shoulder and Ai frantically sent bolts of electricity into his body._

"Boss! Boss! Snap out of it! Boss please, snap out of-"

_Kushina scoffed and removed his goggles, throwing it over her shoulder without hesitation. The tech goggles bounced off the ground, away from its master and its master's viciously possessive mother._

"_No more of those kind of toys, hmm baby." she turned him around and held up a black collar with obsidian black and ruby red gems studded on it. The suppression and restraint seals speckled on the masterful and expensive item, crafted by the Uzumaki princess herself, glowed with ominous darkness as it neared Naruto's neck. "And no more running. Ok? You made mommy worry."_

_The woman smiled lovingly and ran a gentle hand through his mix dyed hair._

"_You've been a very bad boy, Naru-honey…bad boys need to be punished…"_

**Authors note**

**Heheheh…**

**Who here thinks I'm evil? Show of hands please :D**

**How was this chapter? Did you expect him to be flashed back to Konoha?**

**Does he stand a chance against two Kage level shinobi like Kushina and Minato? And let's not forget that his right arm is still in bad shape.**

**Drop your reviews on your thoughts and opinions, would you so kindly. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	14. Chapter 14

**Ssssssssup**

**How's it goin?**

**Shout out to TheKing91, saiyan prince1 (no, he can't), MODdenial, youflesh840 (uheheheh~), aishi, BigY1308 (thanks, man), PinkiePieParty122894 (something **_**will**_** happen…), anthonym3 (I love my cliff hangers, bud. Thanks for your review!), Bravogoodsir, 36Barry72 (I know ^^), shinobinoyami16 (yes, Mikoto is dead for good. Thanks for reviewing!), TheForgottenSuns75, GamerX568, s.k.f.f.f (thank you so much, man. I appreciate it), Spark681, lord 7th (I didn't say he lost, did I? Thank you very, very much for your review!), Derangedmouse (I appreciate you for sticking around, man. Thank you.), Dawood Saqlain (thanks so much, man), jamthacreator and edo123456. You're all fantastic people :)**

**Note: in this chapter (and in a few of my previous chapters) sometimes I'll write numbers in figures (like 56789) and other times I'll write them in words (like one, two and three.) This is the last chapter. It's a bit long.**

**Warning…some of you…might not like how this ends…**

**I won't spoil it any more than that.**

**Enjoy…**

CHAPTER 14

One moment, he was sitting in Demon country, the next he was thrown across a hard, grassy ground in a training ground, surrounded by ANBU.

Minato stood across from him as he got to his feet, activating his boots and calling his gloves and sword to his new location. The rich shinobi watched as the normal black sneakers morphed into a pair of black with red soled combat boots.

"Very cool." He said with a faint smile. His eyebrows twitched when the ANBU began gearing to attack Naruto. "Stand back, he's mine." The black ops deferred respectfully to the Hokage and shuffled away, keeping a wary eye on the so far unpredictable boy. ANBU captain Dog and assistant captain Cat were especially cautious.

Naruto threw off his coat and pushed his goggles onto his forehead from his neck, saying in a strong voice. "Launch my rocket," he felt his super computer about to raise a defence on how he needed to be present but he barked. "Now!"

"_Yes, sir, right away, sir."_

The Yondaime walked around the boy in a wide circle and the boy did so as well, not taking his eyes off the fastest man on the planet for even the shortest of seconds. "A father's job is to keep his children in line. You have caused your mother a lot of pain, Naruto, and I can't forgive that." he lifted his right fist and cracked it threateningly. "You'll have to learn your lesson, Naruto."

Naruto's head lowered slightly, looking up at his father with a dark smirk. His hair cast down a show over his face, only letting his blood chilling red eyes shine out like it was beaming out of the abyss. The boy hit his left fist on his right arm, holding down a wince behind his grit teeth, and the white cast fell down. His eyes followed his father as the man prowled before him, meeting his boy's eyes with a pair of narrowed crystal blue orbs, spinning a Hirashin kunai in his right and flexing his free hand, attentively watching the boy tear off the rest of the cast. His right arm flopped down, paler than his left. Naruto huffed as he closed his right fist, supporting the arm with his left hand.

"Couldn't find a medic for your arm, huh." Minato said with a sly smile. "Don't worry, son, I'll just…break a few bones and get Tsunade to fix them up…no prob."

Naruto grinned and released his right arm, holding it up to the side, away from his body. "I'm good, thanks." A metal contraption whizzed right into his arm, locking in place and hissing lowly as it supported his broken arm. The techno-splint blinked with two lights as the metal plates crept up his arms, over his shoulders and around his neck, covering his right shoulder blade. He flexed his hand again, finding it much, much easier to move before he had the technological support on his arm. The black ops didn't move, looking uncertainly between the boy and the Hokage as his gloves flew in again, also to their surprise. The gloves connected to the splint as his left glove also activated. The difference between his left glove and right was apparent with the addition of the splint on his right arm. The metal plating that protected his right arm was a bright, more flexible but the left was dull and provided more strength in its protection. The boy rolled his shoulders and his red palms slowly started glowing white.

Cat spoke up, placing her hand on the handle of her katana and stepping forward, prompting a few of her subordinates to follow suit. Her gaze was on the boy. "Lord Hokage-"

"Stand down." Minato intoned, studying the boy's marvellous tech with an appreciative smile. His eyes saw a sword hovering in the air, spinning like a top.

Tiger was becoming increasingly worried, even with the explosions and screams coming from inside the village. "Sir-"

"I said…" the Yondaime grunted, giving the man a strong look. "Stand. Down. He's mine." The wood release user stepped back and looked down, deferring to his superior. Minato nodded up at Naruto's sword and said. "You sure you don't want to call your blade down?"

"Nah…"

The boy hopped on his feet five times and then settled on his feet, firmly planting his legs in the ground and lowering into his fighting stance, snapping his goggles down onto his eyes with an errant flick of his hands. The man nodded approvingly at his sons form and stood in a relaxed pose, leaning back a little and looking at his boy with an easy smile. The wind blew, fluttering his white and red flamed cloak and Naruto's dark short sleeved shirt. The man stopped twirling his kunai and fully faced Naruto, bending down into his preferred taijutsu stance, _Flying Hummingbird_ fighting style, and narrowing his eyes at the unpredictable boy, much like him, for that matter.

The ANBU watched with bated breath as father and son stared down each other, unmoving in spite of the wind coming from the warzone deep in the village. They shuffled further back, giving them at least more than enough space for an all-out battle between two similar, though S ranked, combatants. The air was charged, their blonde hair stood on end and chakra flowed in their bodies, primed and ready for the unexpected.

The sword high above spun.

The ground shook.

The trees swayed.

The earth paused.

_CRACK!_

Naruto leapt forward, as did his father, and they pelted to each other.

The tip of Naruto's pointer and middle finger clinked against the tip of Minato's Hirashin kunai and there was stark silence as the man felt the seal on the kunai deactivate and fall apart. Ai immediately began speeding through recharging the _Chakra Destabilizer_ as the short spark of light on the blazing contact died down.

Minato didn't even look surprised.

His knee came up and Naruto blocked with his forearms, stepped back once as the man swung his other leg up for a roundhouse kick, bending under another kick and surging back in after a third follow up kick, aiming a blow to the man's torso but as the hand barely arrived Minato disappeared in a yellow flash, reappearing behind Naruto.

The Yondaime's punch dug into Naruto's back before he could even register the attack and he was thrust forward. Another _crack_ to his side and Minato jammed his elbow into Naruto's jaw, throwing him in another direction, a _thwack_ later and Naruto's legs were swept over his head and a straight kick slammed into his abdomen, carrying him over to the left and into a waiting rising knee to his jaw, lifting him high above the battleground and into a patiently waiting, but burning with righteous fury, axe kick to the centre of his head.

This happened in _two_ seconds.

No one was able to keep track.

All they saw were dozens of sparks of light and then Naruto crashing down to earth like a bolt of lightning, into a crater of his own creation.

Naruto exhaled black smoke as he lay in the crater, his eyes wide and surprised.

"_Sir!"_ Ai barked, bringing him out of his daze and he clambered out of the shallow hole, standing on wobbly feet and laughing shakily, his lips curling up into a sharp grin. Minato was nowhere to be seen or _sensed_. What Naruto did notice, with the help of his goggles, where light blue blips of chakra littered all over the training ground.

Figures.

Minato would drag him back to his home turf on a pre-prepared battleground.

Naruto wasn't much for honouring or respecting his parents for that matter, but he had to give it to his father. The man was smart.

Naruto also appreciated he was being taken seriously.

"Ai…" he mumbled.

"_Already on it, sir."_ The computer answered. It used a small portion of its processing power to call _all_ of Naruto's Beta series drones while at the same time adding its sensory capabilities to its master in order to search for their opponent. _"Sir! I can't find him!"_

Naruto turned around in a full circle; his knees bent in preparation, and looked as well.

He focused his chakra into his eyes and they twitched to his back when he finally felt something-

A fist cracked into his lower back and an elbow smacked into his belly.

Minato's chuckle rumbled through the training ground as Naruto clenched his teeth, pushing himself onto one knee. "Destabilizer." Purple lightning flowed over Naruto's body and flooded out of his body in a rush of air. The black ops leaped back as it approached and stopped at the very edge of a cluster of trees, where the chakra negating air too ended. Naruto heaved in air and go to his feet, turning around again and searching for his father.

A foot crashed into his left cheek, careening him to his right and two punches to his chest slammed him back into the ground.

Naruto groaned and sat up, holding his smarting cheek and closing one eye in frustration. He noticed that the blips of chakra around him were still fully operational. "It…didn't work…?"

"_It did, sir."_

Naruto got to his feet again, after another full sweep of chakra destabilizing air, and was subsequently brought back down onto his face by a savage knee to the back of his head.

Yamato Tenzo, also known as Tiger, snorted and crossed his powerful arms. "As expected of Lord Yondaime; he stands at the pinnacle of humanity."

Viper, Kunoichi in another squad than Tiger, looked at him from the corner of her eyes. "Why do you say that?"

"From my time observing Naruto, I noticed that he has similar sensory abilities as Lady Uzumaki and it is in record that Lord Yondaime is the only one that is able to sneak up on Lady Uzumaki." Viper nodded subtly, acknowledging that even she couldn't sense the Hokage as he tossed Naruto around the training ground.

"But I don't get it," Boar mumbled. The big boned ANBU turned to Tiger. "Didn't reports say that Naruto's 'Destabilizer'" as Tsume called it, from what she had heard Naruto say. "Cancels all forms of chakra. Lord Hokage has his chakra in his Hirashin seal tags but how come they're not being cancelled?"

"Ah, yes, you're not a sensor." Cat hummed, scratching her chin. "Look at the pattern Lord Fourth is using."

_Crack! Crack! Cra-cra-cra-crack!_

Naruto's face slammed into the ground and the earth trembled.

A wave of destabilizing air washed out of him and half a second later, after he stubbornly got to his feet-

_Cr-cr-crack! Crack! Cra-cr-crack!_

The Akimichi's eyes widened. "They're in another pattern."

Sloth sleepily scratched his stomach, idly wincing when a right hook rocked Naruto's head to the side and into the ground, again. "…I…don't…get…it…"

"Yeah," Wolf barked. "How many tags does Lord Hokage have on him anyway?"

"Is Naruto actually cancelling _anything_?" Squid, a newly instated captain of ANBU team thirty three, asked and his teammates nodded earnestly to their captain's question.

Their eyes automatically turned to the most senior ninja in their midst, Tiger's brown eyes also looked to his superior, and Dog sighed dourly. "Really? _I_ have to be the one to explain?" they nodded as one, even the eternally sleepy ninja, Sloth, bobbed his head eagerly. "Lord Minato is picking up his seal tags before each destabilizer and using his natural speed to put them back in place after the destabilizer has gone round."

Sloth yawned. "…His…natural…" everybody tiredly leaned in, painfully waiting for him to finish. "S…S…Speed…?"

Wolf painfully clawed at his mask, frustrated. "Please…don't talk again."

Sloth lifted a thumb up, agonizingly slow. "…R…Roger…"

Dog yawned, trying not to fall asleep at the aura around Wolf's Nara team captain. "Yeah, natural speed. He isn't the Fastest Man on the Planet for nothing, y'know."

"If he's this fast," Cat flinched at a teeth rattling blow straight into Naruto's face. "Then why does he even need his Hirashin seals?"

"I'm duty-bound to keep my lords secrets." A strong glared from at them all later and they promptly kept quiet.

For all his life, Minato had pushed past the realms of normal human capabilities to its breaking point. He had been training and honing his mind and body for longer than he could remember, maybe even during his time in the orphanage. He reached a point in his training that he physically broke through the limits of speed but at the cost of halving his strength. He did this when Jiraiya taught him how to combine his wind and lightning affinities and focus the combined chakra into key tenketsu at his feet, calves, knees and hips, also to his abdomen and lower back.

The explosion of speed could last only half a second before his body could be consumed by lightning, thus killing him. Which was why he couldn't rely on his human speed and created the Hirashin seal.

Still…

Half a second of raw speed, to Minato Namikaze, was more than enough to take him from Konoha all the way to Snow country.

Or so the bingo books collectively wrote.

This was only four minutes into his fight with his father.

'_Fuckin overpowered.'_ Naruto thought with a grumble, knocked aside and smacked with the back of his father's hand across his face. He couldn't possibly hope to outmatch his fathers speed, not currently and not with any spontaneous burst of skill at that very moment, but there _was_ something he could do now.

Lying on the ground, he clenched his fists and pushed them into the ground, gritting his teeth as he got to his feet.

"Stay down, kid." Minato said in an airy tone, projecting his voice in a way that Naruto couldn't exactly pin him down.

Under his goggles, Naruto's crimson red eyes churned and spun, rippling and whirring like whirlpools.

"What secret weapon do you have on you this time?" the Yondaime asked as Naruto got up, holding up his fists and hiding his battered face behind his forearms, swaying ever so subtly.

Naruto was silent.

Kakashi didn't want to doubt his Hokage.

He really didn't.

But, personal experience taught him not to count Naruto out just yet.

His reattached arm lightly throbbed at the memory.

Minato humphed and the battering began again, longer and more drawn out that before, tossing and throwing Naruto around the training ground like a puppet being tossed about in a hurricane. The yellow flash moved about like his moniker described, dazing anyone that looked directly at the fight, it was as if they were looking directly at the sun.

"_Processing power at ninety nine percent."_ Ai said, registering the massive influx of chakra into Naruto's eyes and subsequently enough, the goggles. _"Processing speed at ninety nine point nine percent."_ A punch crashed into Naruto's abdomen, a heel kick cracked into the top of his head and a roundhouse kick into the small of his back carried him away and into a waiting rising knee to his chest. _"Adjusting real-time speed and image resolution." _Naruto growled, huffing at an uppercut and a palm strike to his chest. _"Real-time speed, 0.001x. Image resolution, 1000x. Warning, influx of chakra may damage sensory disks."_

"Just," Naruto grunted after a blow that hit him square in his face. "Do it!"

"_Ready, boss."_

Then the world stopped.

"_Solar-Chakra mode: Activated."_

Naruto's body froze in mid-air, in a position after receiving a right hook to his face and twisting into another fist aiming for his nose. Minato stood still, his fist unmoving as Naruto as Naruto's eyes spun quickly, not unlike an activated sharingan, and the fist slowly reached his face. He closed his eyes and braced for impact, grinding his teeth as his face caved in under his father's punch. A hexagon spiralled into life in front of his left eye and, in the split second before Minato could retract his hand and flash away to the location he would receive Naruto for yet another attack, the reliable computer struck.

"Chakra Destabilizer_."_

The Yellow Flash saw the air coming for him, faster than before and more precise at his own chakra network, and he summarily flashed away in real-time, reappearing in the receiving point for another punch to Naruto's face.

His fist surged to Naruto.

The arm flopped bonelessly against Naruto's face and the boy was ready with his own retaliation; dark purple fire billowed out from his right boot and his foot rose up with super speed, cracking noisily against his father's chin.

The boys first tag in was a devastating one, enough to flash the man away from him and into a group of his loyal black ops, taking them with him into a copse of trees.

Naruto landed on the ground with a shallow _thunk_, and he cracked his chin with his left fist, sniffing once before white energy blasted from the bottom of his boots. He hopped past the shocked ninjas and went after his father, his head lowered in concentration as he tracked the man standing back up, rubbing his painfully sore chin and disappearing again. A yellow flash to Naruto's right and a foot came towards Naruto's shoulder but the boy had his left hand pointed at him.

_ZZZIP!_

The man bent away from the photon beam, exhaling in relief and quickly ducking another blast of energy from his son.

'_I need to get my hands on him.'_ Naruto thought his eyes twitching left and right as he kept track of each and every disappearance and reappearance of his legendary S ranked father, while at the same time conveying the message to his super computer teammate. Optic Motion Morse code was what Naruto called it, writing a message with his eyes when he didn't have his half mask with him. Naruto leaned back from a grab for his mask and caught the fist, dragging his father closer and blasting out another destabilizer but grunting when it was only a log of wood he had in his hands. His eyes brightened. _'I know!'_

The white photon energy in his right hand was replaced by the violent crackling of blue lightning, charging up in his fist. He slid under a straight kick and pointed the fist at the Yondaime.

"_Blood Hound."_ He opened his hand and a small metallic ball merged with the lightning and flashed to the mildly surprised man, who still nursed his limp right arm. The bolt of lightning moved in a single string, crackling with the intensity of a ravenous beast as it surged around the forest, blowing up wet trees and making dry leaves burst on fire, doggedly following the Yondaime as he flashed about Naruto. The added task of carrying a 'chakra-less' arm along with him with each flash was what slowed him down ever so slightly, enough for a simple bolt of lightning to more or less keep track of him, and with each blink of yellow light Naruto's eyes kept careful track.

He counted in his head.

'_One, two, three-one, two, three-one, two, three-one, two, three-'_ his left arm suddenly snapped up and grabbed the man by his left arm as he made to pass by Naruto in a hasty retreat from the tech controlled bolt of lightning, and with the grab also came an explosion of destabilizing chakra.

This time, Minato could only wrench his arm out of Naruto's grasp but wasn't fast enough to actually save it from its 'chakra-less' fate. The man stumbled away, his arms bonelessly swinging at his sides, and he cried when a solid foot met his back and with it came a blast of skin searing purple fire, blasting him clear out of the forest and back into the training ground.

He landed with a crash and roared in pain at the burn marks on his back, his charred cloak and jounin vest flopped about him, ready to crumble to dust if so much as a small flicker of heat touched it, and Naruto landed by his head, his heavy boots _thumping_ on the ground.

The man cast aside his pride, anticipating the skull crushing stomp from his son, and bellowed. "GET HIM!"

A wave of torrential chakra negating air flooded out from Naruto as they poured down on him, a few were lucky to have shunshin'd away. Minato was among those unfortunate enough to have their chakra destabilized, rendering him weaker than even a civilian baby. The man lay on his face, unable to move, as he heard the sounds of active combat around him.

Naruto caught his katana in his right hand, channelling cell splitting photon energy into the blade, and clashed it against an incoming tanto, slashing the blade and continuing the downward motion and cleaving the stunned black ops Kunoichi in half. Naruto kicked her upper half, forcing Cat to catch it, swept the dying woman's legs and straight kicked it into Cat again; using enough force in the blow to take the assistant captain off her feet and onto the ground, the screaming of the cleaved-in-half Kunoichi filled her ears. Naruto reversed his hold and deflected twenty shuriken, burning the ninja wires connected to it and catching five ninja stars in his other hand, dragging it to him and cracking his forehead into the junior shinobi's mask, shattering it and knocking him out.

The tech genius twirled the blade once as he turned on his feet, looking back at the now uncertain ninjas surrounding him.

Eighteen, he counted.

He was still in _Solar-Chakra mode_.

A dark smirk grew on his face and he flicked his sword again, switching it back to the normal grip and catching the sheath of the katana in his other hand, holding that one in a reverse grip. One before him, one crossed behind him at his lower back.

Blood gently trickled down from his nose at the massive influx of information flooding his senses, mostly his eyes.

'_Wood release user, Nara, Nara, Nara, Akimichi, Kakashi Hatake, water affinity, Yugao Uzuki, ROOT, ROOT, Hyuuga, Yamanaka, Hyuuga, fire and wind affinity, another water affinity, Kurama, Inuzuka and ninken, and Uchiha.'_

"_Take it easy, boss."_ Ai said worriedly. _"You're going to overload yourself."_

"I'm fine." Naruto grunted.

The ground shook then and Naruto looked up, catching a trail of black smoke lift off from where he could vaguely guess was Demon country.

"Make sure it's set up properly. I can handle these guys." Naruto muttered and Dog cocked his head to the side.

"You sure about that, Naruto?" he asked, he swept his hands to his high ranked comrades. "This isn't two-on-one, like last time."

"Why don't you come and find out, Kakashi?"

Three shadows shot to him and fastened him to the ground. His boots vibrated subtly, shattering the Nara clan ability and he leaped aside as the lone Yamanaka dove at him with his own clan based ability. Naruto fired a beam at the limp body of the blonde man, burning a hole through where his head used to be. Two beams honed towards two of the dumbfounded Nara, wondering how a boy many years their junior could break out of a _Shadow Snare jutsu_. They were pulled aside quickly and that was when the ROOT ninjas Danzo had sent lost their patience.

Naruto had Orochimaru's memories and he had Mikoto's memories. He knew of the ROOT but not the exact identities of the ninjas there. These two were masquerading as Viper and Boar. The rest took their attack as their cue to attack as well.

Viper slinked under a slash from the photon blade, avoided being brained by the sheath and gave way for Boar to bring down a meaty paw on the boy, not counting Naruto cutting through the hand and pulsing out a destabilizer as he ran up the limp man's hand, he used Boar as a foothold, scorching his head in the process, and dove at Viper as she went through a sequence of hand seals.

"_Toxin release: Acid Mist Barricade."_ She blew out dark green air at her incoming aggressor, not counting him to shoot her down with a beam of energy from his goggles. The beam burned through her chest and felled her, while Naruto held his breath and let go of his katana, waving his hand at the wall of tissue melting acid.

"_Wind Manipulation: Tempest."_ Cool gales of wind blew from his right glove and he harmlessly passed the relatively clean air, wincing as residual acid hissed harmlessly on his face. The strong tech manifested winds blew apart the chakra construct but not enough to completely disperse it, hence the small blisters on Naruto's forehead, which were gradually reducing because of his natural body regeneration. He grabbed his sword again and crossed it over his chest, using it to push back a pillar of earth and spinning on his left heel, delivering an overhead kick with his fire coated right food to Sloth, who slinked around the blow and, in a surprisingly fast sequence of deliveries, tapped Naruto's boots with his fingers, coated with protective chakra to prevent getting burned, and slithered under Naruto's sheath swing to tap his arms with his fingers.

He didn't notice Naruto's movements slow down.

"You…really…not…using…chakra…huh."

The subtle genjutsu didn't work either.

"_Genjutsu successfully repelled, sir."_

Naruto slashed at him, hopping back when Sloth burst into black mist.

"My mask would have been great right about now." Naruto mumbled. He didn't have any retrieval mechanism installed on his mask that would allow it to fly to his location. In his distraction, Kakashi shot at him and kicked his wrist, flinging the photon blade away from him.

Tiger clapped his hands together, and faced his right palm at the sword, saying. _"Wood release: Sealing arts: Shodaime Hokage's Cage."_

Wood poles flew out of his palm and converged on the dangerously humming blade, covering it entirely and forming a wooden cage. The blade banged and clanged inside, unable to free itself and Naruto hummed, impressed.

"I don't need a sword to cut through all of you." He said, holding his sheath in his dominant hand-right hand- and whacking it down at a black ops Kunoichi that had tried to pull him into the ground with a tunneling earth jutsu, cracking her skull.

Kakashi signed to his subordinates.

_No jutsu. Hand-to-hand and long range support only. Watch out for his destabilizer._

At that same time, he saw a warning alarm in his goggles, Ai typed down. _"Overheating destabilizer fans and speakers. Five minute cool down required."_ Naruto's eyes ignored the warnings and lowered himself into his fighting stance, holding his black sheath with both hands and glaring at his incoming opponents.

As they poured on Naruto, Kakashi raced around Naruto to Minato, holing a seal tag filled to the very brim with the Yondaime's chakra, intending to use it to force open the incapacitated man's chakra core.

Naruto wasn't having any of that.

He thwacked the sheath against a random head, crashing his elbow into someone's nose and swept his foot on the ground, felling two ninjas and shooting them down with unsuppressed photon beams, killing them.

He never ventured more than a foot from his father.

Three punches found their place in a ninja's abdomen; he spun on his foot and dislocated the taller ninja's jaw with a roundhouse kick, throwing his sheath at Kakashi as he neared his father's downed form, idly controlling it as it homed in on the copy ninja. He bent under a clubbing blow that certainly would have taken his head off, from ANBU operative Wolf, and the boy raised his forearms over his chest to deflect numerous clawed strikes, purposefully aimed to push him back but the boy dig his feet into the ground and endured it. His goggles screamed and glowed bright white and the Inuzuka ran away from the photon beam, Naruto turned his head and the deadly light carved death and destruction around him, until Naruto blinked twice, feeling the goggles heat up ever so slightly.

Meanwhile, a trail of smoke kept rising up in the sky, gradually passing through the air and off the earth.

He hastily lowered himself onto the ground and placed his palms on the grass, muttering. _"Earth Manipulation: Slick Sand."_

The grass-and the ground-immediately softened and gave way, sucking in the few that were not quick enough to jump into trees. Naruto used the screams of suffocation and agony to run a quick personal inventory, idly shooting those trapped in the thick, soupy ground.

Ten magnetic senbon in a case in his left back pocket, they were shorter and not really standard issue but no less saturated with poison. Five explosive homing kunai and shuriken on holsters on his right and left thighs, two more _Chakra Attacking drones_, which were little pieces of technology that doggedly chased any trace amount of chakra Naruto keyed into it via its goggles. Naruto mostly used it as the core-or heart-of his more sentient _Nature Manipulations_, like the False Phoenix that had drastically reduced Kakuzu's masks. He could only use plasma and photon beams from his goggles sparingly, to ensure not to overheat or overload Ai's system, but his gloves and boots had inbuilt cooling systems to ensure nothing bad happened if he used, say, a plasma beam from longer than five seconds, which was unlikely with how effective the cell destroying beam was. As long as the sun was still up and his solar cell batteries were full, he could blast plasma and photon beams to his heart's content. Though plasma was always reliable in ending lives, from Naruto's astute observation, he used its slightly lesser-and more refined-form, photon more because it was faster and cleaner.

He popped out a bolt of photon energy, ripping off an ANBU's leg and used his other hand to bathe the man in dark purple fire, using his shin to block a tanto strike and searing off his attackers stomach with more purple fire.

Naruto's Nature Manipulation was as dependable as his other two energy attacks in the sense that it took less strain and the results, though usually successful, varied from time to time. One manipulation by itself was good but combining them would increase its effectiveness and it was the combination of fire and lightning that Naruto made his _Purple Hellfire_.

The inventor fell back into a crab from a jab to his chin, flicking his legs up to block a katana blade with his soles and jamming both feet to push back his bladed oppressor. Cat hastily stepped aside before the tussle could become top drawn out and Naruto spun on his hands, his hellfire burning legs wind milling about and striking at random, without bias or remorse.

"_Fire and Lightning manipulation: Sunset Inferno Blizzard."_

"Give me my chakra, Kakashi!" Minato roared, feeling the heat from his son's hurricane building up with each dextrous hand spin. The purple fire soon rose up into the heavens in a warbling, wailing column of hellfire. The short sleeves of Naruto's shirt fell off in black clumps and the man below him howled at the impossible heat in the fire. Naruto wasn't resistant to his own fire, not completely, but since it was with his power that he manifested the fire, its effects were limited to only heavy sweat pouring down from his face and a burning sensation in his chest.

The fire caught those around and their tormented screams rend through the air.

It sounded like hell had come on earth, in Minato's ears, feeling the skin on his back and the back of his head slip and fall in small clumps due to the unimaginably hot inferno.

Naruto suddenly stopped spinning, as three surviving black ops skirted around the blaze of dark, evil fire, flipped onto his feet and crossed his forearms before his face.

"_Wind manipulation: Fire Blizzard Expansion."_

His arms opened wide, palms touching the edges of the fire he had wrought.

"Fall back!" Dog shouted, fleeing with Cat from the surging purple fire that was rapidly expanding. The wind manipulation manoeuvre was meant to compliment the fire and lightning blizzard, seeing as the wind added fuel to the fire while at the same time pushing it outwards. "Cat!"

The battle in Konoha paused at the sight.

Dog grabbed Cat by her left upper arm and ran, wheezing for air as the fire snatched it all out of its surroundings, using it to propel itself out more and more, burning the forests and killing the wildlife. The man had his eyes half closed, focusing on keeping his breath and fleeing for his and his subordinate's life, he turned to his right and saw Sloth swinging from tree to tree, and for once his eyes were wide with horror as he too ran for dear life from the purple hellfire. The out of breath woman he was supporting huffed and wheezed pitifully, using the crook of her arm to cover her nose, trying as best as she could to not inhale the thick black smoke around them.

The fire kept chasing them, lashing out towards them at random with unintentional tendrils of death, carving out charred paths with each swipe.

One such swipe lashed against Sloth's back but he kept on swinging, enduring the pain, even as large blisters and boils grew on his back.

Pain could come later, he needed to run _now_.

"S-S-Senpai…" Cat mumbled weakly, coughing and hacking. Dog spared a quick look down at her and gulped at the blood she was coughing up into the crook of her arm.

His blood ran cold as the fire kept coming.

"Don't worry…" he muttered, mustering up some form of hope in his voice. "We'll get out of here soon."

"S-Senpai…" she repeated, her eyes feeling heavy as more smoke poured through her mask and into her lungs. Kakashi wasn't doing so well himself but he couldn't waver, not with hell itself chasing them. "S-Senpai…I-I…I can't feel my legs…"

Kakashi gulped and his chest trembled, fighting the urge to look back. He didn't want to see the stumps that were now her legs. "You'll be fine-"

"I'm dead weight, Kakashi-senpai." The woman said, her shoulders losing some strength and her head flopped up and down with each running motion. "I'm slowing you down…"

"Shut it." Kakashi said through grit teeth. "I'm not leaving you behind."

"Senpai…p-please…"

"No! I'm not leaving you!"

Yugao smiled tiredly and rested her head on his shoulder, allowing herself to be carried by her captain. "What…am I going to…with you…sen…pai…"

Her eyes closed and they never opened again.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Back in the eye of the hurricane, Naruto picked up his father by his neck, ignoring how the man winced in pain at the scorching heat coming from his hands.

Naruto could see his father's skull. The hair and skin had melted off, revealing the whiteness of his skull and before he had picked up the man, he had seen that the skin on his back had also fallen off; showing bits and pieces of his ribs and spin, to his upper pelvis.

The man was in so much pain.

There was no word that could possibly hope to describe it.

Naruto lifted the man up to his eye level-

_Cerulean blue eyes stood at the door, motionless, staring at a red haired woman bouncing happily on a black haired boy. Kushina's body trembled with ecstasy, pleasure flooding her very pores over and over again with each desperate jump from her hips. Her hands ran through her hair and she screamed, her purple eyes rolled back into her head as she once again entered into the thickness of pleasure. Desire rolled off her in wet waves, overcoming the man at Naruto's bedroom door but only for the boy lying below her, the one crying with each pump from the woman._

"_M-Mommy!" Naruto cried, clawing at his eyes and his legs vainly putting up a struggle under the stronger Uzumaki. "M-Mommy stop!" Kushina bit her bottom lip and came again. "I don't want to! P-please stop!" Naruto cried and his head shook, turning away when the woman lowered herself to kiss him._

_His eyes went to the door and he felt hope grow in him, from the pit of his stomach and sweeping through the rest of his being._

"_Daddy!" he wailed._

_Minato stood, his jaw strong and his shoulders rigid, staring at the sight of his wife driving herself to the very peak of pleasure on their own son._

"_Daddy, help me!" Naruto shouted, his small hands reaching for his father, the one he looked up to. "Please, daddy! Please!"_

_The man looked at him, seeing the anguish and torment on his sons face, the utter displeasure for sex and the growing aversion for it that would no doubt plague the boy for years and years to come. The smart man could also seeing the boy being traumatised for life, associating women with sex and developing a phobia._

_Maybe Naruto already had the phobia._

_Minato's studies into the human mind and body were extensive, that much couldn't be underestimated, and so he saw, with his very own eyes, his son teeter on the edge of no return._

"_Daddy!"_

_The boys fingers clawed at the bed, trying to run to the man he idolized._

"_Help me!"_

_His decision would change his son forever._

_Cheating on him aside, Naruto had been showing rapid progress in his studies and training. He could guess that this incestuous relationship had been going on for a while._

_Minato turned around._

_Kushina knew what she was doing, then._

"_What time is dinner, babe?"_

_Amid the pleasure, Kushina turned to her beloved husband and answered. "At seven, honey." He nodded and proceeded to walk away. He could hear Naruto's heart shatter as he plodded down the stairs. "Love you, Minato!"_

"_Love you too." He said back, in a subdued voice._

_Naruto's wail broke through his mind as he took his seat at the head of the table, ready to riffle through a late newspaper._

"_DADDY, NO!"_

-before Ai could shock Naruto back into reality, the blonde-grey haired boy yanked himself back and snarled at the man.

His goggles slowly began glowing white, squealing lowly at first before it increased to just about loud enough to join the purple fire crackling about him. The light was focused directly over Naruto's spinning red eyes.

"Naruto, stop!" Minato said, cursing his helpless state. "Don't do this!"

"You could have helped…and you didn't…" the boy whispered. "I asked for your help…I begged you for help…and you…did…nothing…"

"I-I-I-I c-co-couldn't a-anything." The man blubbered. "K-Kushina, you see-"

"I don't want to hear it." Naruto said with finality.

"Naruto, no-"

The plasma eye beam shot forward and slowly dug its way into Minato's head. The man's body trembled and quacked as the plasma made its way past his eyes and into his head, shooting through his brain and setting the cells on fire.

Naruto took his sweet time making his way to the back of his father's skull, a sick grin etched on his face as he did so.

It was when the plasma broke out of the back of Minato's head that the Yondaime Hokage finally fell limp in Naruto's hand; his mouth gaping, his eyes black and hollow and thick brain matter seeping out of his ears and nose, dribbling out of the corners of his mouth.

Naruto tossed him forward without much thought and closed his hands, dragging back the lightning and in the hellfire, which in turn forced the wind and fire to return to him as well. He didn't have the tech to instantly extinguish his hellfire and he wasn't too keen on using his chakra so he did the next best thing.

He swept his hands up to the sky and the hellfire roared, flying upwards. From his calculations, the fire would curve towards the south some hundred miles above the ground and then crash in the ocean, which _would_ extinguish it.

The boy looked around with grim eyes, at the devastation and death in the training ground.

If only they left him alone, none of this would have happened.

The forest was burnt to a crisp by his fire and the animal life there was long dead now. The village would struggle to return the ecosystem back to normal, an unfortunate result of their own single minded devotion to their now dead Hokage. Naruto wasn't much of a fan of taking out his aggression on nature itself, especially with the amount of untapped potential he could safely harness from it, but if that was what he had to do to prove a point, then so be it.

Naruto sighed and his shoulders relaxed.

"Let Konan go, Ai." He said in a quiet, solemn voice.

Throughout his battle with his father and the upper ranked black ops, and even before his arrival, Pein and his Paths had been in active combat with his mother. The rinnegan holder spared nothing for the Uzumaki princess and utilized the village without hesitation. A video feed from one of Naruto's surveillance drones, deployed since before he sent Nagato on his mission, played the fight.

As far as he could see, Nagato had lost his Human, Naraka and Animal path and the rest were struggling against the powerhouse lady. Their chakra level was low and Kushina used sealing methods unseen since the time of Uzushio's shinobi dominance to whittle down the _Shinra tensei_ and _Bansho tenin_ of the godly power of the deva path, her brute strength to neutralize the mechanical power of the Asura path and her almost inexhaustible chakra to overwhelm the chakra draining abilities of the Preta path.

A golden chain found itself inside the Preta paths head and it swung the path around, using it to break off two of the Asura paths arms and smack the Deva path away as it made to forcefully bring the woman to him.

The village was in shambles.

Dead bodies littered around them.

Blood soaked the ground and the intruder siren still wailed, ushering civilians and genin into protective underground bunkers far away from the devastating battle.

The same chain in the Preta paths head sealed it away into a small pebble and Kushina broke the pebble under her foot, grinning madly at the corpses.

Somewhere in the outskirts of Ame, Konan heard a chilling click on the bomb vest over her torso and the red blinking light stopped. She quickly took it off and ran as fast as her legs could carry her to Ame.

Naruto swiped away the video, looking at his mother from this distance was close enough.

White energy buzzed under his feet and he prepared to take off, but then…

Naruto felt her chakra presence wash over him in overbearing waves before he even heard her voice.

"Naru-baby!" she called and his body froze, standing ramrod in the centre of the decimation caused by his own hand. "I missed you, honey!"

Petrified.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and Ai frantically sent bolts of electricity into his body.

"Boss! Boss! Snap out of it! Boss please, snap out of-"

Kushina scoffed and removed his goggles, throwing it over her shoulder without hesitation. The tech goggles bounced off the ground, away from its master and its master's viciously possessive mother.

"No more of those kind of toys, hmm baby." she turned him around and held up a black collar with obsidian black and ruby red gems studded on it. The suppression and restraint seals speckled on the masterful and expensive item, crafted by the Uzumaki princess herself, glowed with ominous darkness as it neared Naruto's neck. "And no more running. Ok? You made mommy worry."

The woman smiled lovingly and ran a gentle hand through his mix dyed hair.

"You've been a very bad boy, Naru-honey…bad boys need to be punished…"

Somewhere in the back of his mind, the scared child in him curled up into a ball and accepted his fate.

The choker closed around his neck and he felt his body weaken as his chakra was sealed away.

Ai became frantic as it lost sense of Naruto's chakra and the _Solar-Chakra mode_ turned off.

Kushina smiled motherly, dropping to her knees and pulling him into a warm hug. Naruto stayed still in her arms.

"This time, I'm going to do it differently. I'll show you my love even more, so you don't run away from me again." She whispered earnestly. Naruto's arms hung limply at his sides as she hugged him harder, pressing her nose into his neck and inhaling his scent deeply. "No more fighting, no more training, no more techy toys…I'm going to quit from the ninja force." Her eyes glanced to the smoky corpse of her and she sniffed. "Too bad…too bad…I loved him, but you know what?" she placed her dainty hands on his shoulders and held him at arms-length, looking at him with so much love and adoration, Naruto felt a stirring deep in his stomach. "I love you more."

The petrified teen remained silent, his red eyes were wide and broken.

"I love you more than the sands in the desert." She said, repeating the words she always told him when he was younger. "More than the stars in the sky." His head slumped to the side when she hugged him again, happy to have him back in her arms. "More than the fish in the sea." Her voice became lower and her ruby red lips touched his ear, whispering. "More than Kami herself loves the earth."

His breathing became shallow, almost unnoticeable.

"I love you so much, Naruto." His mother said quietly. "I'm never going to let you go again."

Her lips twitched up when his arms flexed, rising up and returning her hug. She felt tears stain her own shoulder as Naruto buried his face into her neck, mutely crying.

"I…love you…mommy…"

With those words, Naruto felt his soul crumble into dust.

He flicked his right hand.

_Ssssshing!_

His hidden kunai slid its way into her back, between two of his mothers ribs and impaled her heart.

Kushina felt her eyes tear up even more and her smile shook sadly. "Naruto…" she pulled away from her, holding him by his shoulders. Naruto looked back at her, a small smile on his lips and tears cascading down his eyes. His arms held her sides as the kunai pulsed and ebbed blood out of her back, stabbed right down to its hilt and puncturing a hole in her heart.

Stabbed in the back…by her own son…

…Of all the ways to go out...

Survived the third ninja war, gained a notorious name for herself and was a force to be reckoned with.

Her angel was too good for this world anyway.

The woman sniffed and Naruto brought her back into the hug, slowly calming her down, stroking the back of her head and swaying from side to side.

"Let's…" the Uzumaki began, feeling her vital life blood seep from her back. Blood dripped onto Naruto's shoulder as she silently sobbed. "Let's go to heaven…together."

Naruto remained silent, only holding onto his mother harder, bracing himself.

"_Boss, no!"_

_BOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!_

**Authors note**

**Drop a review if you want an epilogue.**

**Let me know what you think, would you so kindly. Stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.**

**Foy.**


	15. Chapter 15

**Ello**

**How are you guy's doin?**

**I've got lots of people to shout out to-and I'm gonna give a shout out to **_**all**_** of them-, so bear with me.**

**Shout out to SPBRX, anthonym3 (cliff hangers make the world go round, bud!), Inzaneamaru (thanks, man), grimmouse197 (I appreciate it, dude), vampireanka1 (Maybe…), PinkiePieParty122894, saiyan prince1 (as always, thank you so much, man), Spark681, MODdenial (nah, he won't. Thanks for your wonderful review!), shinobinoyami16, Gogetsu (read to find out, bud), Bravogoodsir (haha, nice to know I got that kind of reaction, man), TheForgottenSuns75 (ayyy thanks, dude), youflesh840 (thank you!), LordofTerror (uhehehe~), Dancingrage (he would, yeah. Thanks for your words!), Soledge1, Cboylan (we'll never know…), BigY1308 (I'm really glad. Thank you so, so much, man), dreamkiller415, Zeno-Chan (hurray for not being predictable! Thanks, dude), Grounded Forever (thanks!), TheKing91 (I try my best, thank you), lord 7th (hehehe~), Pat123, OverseerOfHimself, Dawood Saqlain (haha alright, man), aishi, Kodos94, s.k.f.f.f, GamerX568 and 36Barry72 (muahahaha~). You're all marvellous people :)**

**Thank you all for reading. I appreciate the living hell out of you guys.**

**I see I surprised you all with how I ended the last chapter XD**

**This is the very last part of **_**this**_** Naruto's epic story. This is too long to be called an epilogue but I'm still calling it an epilogue glob darn it.**

**Did he survive the bomb?**

**You'll just have to read and see…**

**Enjoy.**

**EPILOGUE**

_Death._

_It wasn't like anything he thought it would be._

_First he felt heat, an excruciating fire that bathed his whole body, tortured wailing and petrified screams, none of which sounded like him, echoing around him as he felt himself burn and fall, falling deeper and deeper into blackness._

_Then he felt peace._

_Deafening, ringing silence._

_Perilous, empty nothing._

Long sticks poked around in the blast zone, pushing aside massive clumps of rocks upturned by the bomb. The search party covered their lower faces with bandannas or their elbows, protecting their lungs from the thin smoke permeating out from the ground and flitting around like a stubborn phantom, an effigy of the death that had taken out nearly more than half of the village.

Ashes littered where their used to be trees and lush grass, silt covered where their used to be soft, fertile soil and charred bodies, bent and crippled into painful positions of death, were what remained of most of the black ops that couldn't get away quick enough from the hellfire, not to talk of the hyper powered kunai.

A small cabin made out of wood crashed down into pieces of burnt black wood and the corpse inside, curled up in a foetal position, creaked as wind users tried to sweep fresh air into the environment. Yamato did not know that his wood construct could only protect him from chakra-based attacks. Naruto's hellfire had no chakra and his bomb certainly had no chakra.

Not a drop.

He died and curled up in himself like an insect before he could realize his own mistake.

Some in the search party prayed for the unfortunate, presently unidentified victim of the blaze and bomb. The skeleton was too warped and disfigured to be given a definite identity.

The fact that there was no chakra in the air clued them in on who had set off the bomb. The power and blast radius of the bomb also clued them in on who it had been used on.

The point of the explosion was obvious; a deep depression in the ground with solid black, earthy spikes jutting out from the edges.

The remaining shinobi went about their search in solemn silence, hesitantly watching their step to ensure they didn't trigger another chakra-less bomb from the dead Yondaime's son. They first looked around the blast zone, offering silent prayers for the dead they found; gnarly black hands poking out from the ground, silently screaming vaguely humanoid looking heads, burnt ninjas curled up in a foetal position, long dead, and various body parts scattered here and there, hardened by the flames of hellfire and crackling on contact from the heat from the bomb.

A soot covered ninja slowly slid into the deep crater, where the bomb had blown up, and his eyes widened at what he found.

"I've found someone!" his yell alerted the rest and a good portion swarmed towards him.

_As Naruto descended into the abyss, somewhere at the back of his head he wondered who would cry when the news came out that he was dead._

_Faces flew by behind his eyelids and he exhaled tiredly, not feeling the air leave his lungs._

_He felt cold._

_A gradual chill, starting from the tips of his fingers and toes and spreading to his whole body, his heart and down into the empty chasm that used to house his soul, and he shivered._

"Get that thing off him!" Shizune barked, roughly shoving Kotetsu-the one that found Naruto's body-aside and grabbing hold of the black studded choker on Naruto's neck, the one blocking his chakra and standing in the way of the boy's natural regeneration kicking in. She felt his pulse and panicked.

It was weak, slow, as if it was receding into the arms of the grim reaper.

She tried with all her might to rip off the collar but to no avail. She saw the whirlpool tag at the front and yelled.

"Lady Tsunade!"

_Naruto wrinkled his nose as he smelt rotten, decaying corpses._

Naruto's whole upper right side was gone, Tsunade observed as she removed the collar with by swiping her blood across the whirlpool tag, which authorized her by sensing the trace amounts of Uzumaki DNA in her blood. From the crook of his neck, curving down to his lower abdomen.

Gone.

A massive chunk was taken out from his legs too, his right thigh.

His lower jaw had been blown off; his whole nose and left cheek were gone too.

Yet, she could still feel a small pulse from his neck, but he wasn't breathing.

"How are you still alive, brat?" the Senju muttered and began healing whatever she could heal. She found a piece of cloth to cover his lower face, hiding his hideous disfiguration, and hurriedly went on working, trying her possible best to revive the broken boy.

He still wasn't breathing.

The same could be said about Kushina.

The Uzumaki princess's entire torso was gone, leaving just her head and her limbs, scorched black and super hardened by the heat of the bomb.

"I've found Lord Yondaime!" a voice called loudly. The Senju didn't care much about that, because she was too occupied performing CPR on the unresponsive boy. She pumped his chest, what was left of it, and pinched his nose shut, breathing air into his left lung, which inflated his chest, but he didn't continue breathing on his own. "I've found Kakashi and Yugao!"

_The smell of death best described the horrible odour invading his nose, and he couldn't move to cover them either. He couldn't open his eyes to look around the abyss he was slowly plummeting in and he couldn't feel anything to know if he had reached the floor and was surrounded by dead bodies or he was still falling._

Tsunade refused to let Naruto go.

He needed to serve the punishment for creating such pandemonium in the village.

Families were wiped out, lives were snuffed out and buildings were destroyed.

Someone needed to claim responsibility for this terrible tragedy.

Kushina and Minato were dead, so they were out of the question.

"Don't die on me, damn it." she swore. "Stretcher!"

_Wind whipped his face and hollow moans sounded._

A breathing mask was placed on Naruto's face; Shizune kept her hand at the bottom of the mask and kept on pumping air into Naruto's mouth with her left hand pressing the small plastic ball at the end of the mask. They were now in an emergency hospital tent. Naruto's stretcher was placed on the ground and Tsunade immediately began shouting orders, yelling for the onlookers to get out of the tent and give them space.

Blood began pumping out of Naruto's mouth, amid the blood already pouring out from Naruto's gaping body.

The legendary medic looked up to her apprentice and said. "We need to do an emergency tissue replication." The black haired medic nodded and a nurse wheeled in Minato's burnt remains on a small trolley, selecting the least burnt part of the Hokage's body-his inner upper arm-and placing it before the woman. They couldn't perform a transplant because they were dealing with the effects of burns; hence the most viable and most accessible donor-Minato-could not provide anything vaguely useful for a transplant. Bones couldn't be replicated from the cells, only transplanted, so the focus would be Naruto's soft tissue.

The nurse watched on, mildly mortified that the Yellow Flash's body was being desecrated to save the boy that had destroyed the village.

Tsunade flipped through fifty hand seals and said. _"Healing art: Mystic Palm True Body Replication technique."_

The nurse began contemplating whether her death would be painful if she jammed a needle into the boys head, killing him. Her mistress's jutsu did its work, restoring Naruto's right lung, his diaphragm and his thigh. They didn't have any available ribs to give him. The chakra consumption was monumental. Drugs to encourage his healing were steadily pumped in through multiple tubes, and his heart and brain were closely monitored.

Still no breathing.

"What am I doing wrong?" the star medic asked herself as she held her forehead, thinking hard.

The nurse removed the cap on a syringe and inched closer to the still boy, looking as if she wanted to get a closer look at Naruto, but Shizune, still holding the oxygen mask to Naruto's face, not even looking at the civilian, simply said.

"Don't."

Her tone hinted what would happen if she went along with her plan.

Suddenly, noise came from outside and Shizune jerked her head to the tent flaps. "Find out what's happening." the petite nurse scurried away but was soon blasted back by a gust of wind. "What the-"

Five red eyed robots tore the tent out of the ground.

Over one of the robots eyes were black goggles.

"_Step away from boss!"_ they all yelled and Tsunade cracked her knuckles, clenching her teeth in anger. She saw that not less than forty more, differently styled robots hovered over the weakened village, poised to attack. _"Or we will raze the village down!"_

Every single robot Naruto, from his Alpha-Beta-Gama-Delta series, to his reconnaissance and cleaning drones, buzzed over the frightened people.

"_You have to the count of three-"_

"Ok, ok!" Tsunade said, raising her hands and stepping back from Naruto, nodding for Shizune to do so as well. A cleaning robot whizzed in and took over holding the oxygen mask over Naruto's face and three Alpha Fire drones blocked the two medics view for the boy. Five cleaning bots swiped medicine out from the cabinet, not at random either, from what the woman could see.

The Senju acknowledged the power the boy had and the knowledge he had on his own and in his robots.

She was the most likely candidate for Hokage now.

She didn't like it much but she had little choice with the state the village was in now. The ninjas that hadn't been killed by the rinnegan holder or the Yondaime's son were in too much of a bad shape to help in the fight and she was low on chakra after she had restored Naruto's right lung and right thigh. The shinobi left were chunin and genin and, seeing as she too read the report from ninjas that encountered Naruto-Kakashi and Tsume-she knew the village, at the moment, was no match for the young inventor's many inventions. So she stared at the Alpha Lightning drone wearing Naruto's tech goggles and said.

"If you revive him up…somehow…" she added to express her doubt that Naruto would survive without her help. "Let him know…if he steps ever foot in Fire country ever again, then I will have his head. Once the Leaf is back on its feet…we're coming for him. You hear me?!" she growled and her hands cracked louder. "We are coming for him!"

Ai shook its head. _"You have not learnt from your predecessor, Minato Namikaze, or his wife, Kushina Uzumaki. Or even the score of ninjas that have come after my boss; the nine S ranks that failed to capture him and the many lesser ranked that had failed to capture him."_ the robot stared down the quietly festering medic. _"My advice to you, Lady Tsunade, is to leave my boss alone…and he would leave you alone."_

She wanted to crush that robot's head _so_ bad.

Her attention went to a Delta Water drone, a more nimble and milder robot, as it gently inserted a long needle into Naruto's heart and pressed down a little.

_Ba-dum…ba-dum…ba-dum…_

_Naruto's eyebrows crinkled at the heavy sound interrupting the sound of lost souls moaning for mercy._

Two more Delta series robots-water and earth-lifted up the stretcher tenderly while two cleaning robots hefted the machines and the drip flowing into their master. The hummed as they levitated high into the air, moving slowly so as not to unsettle the needle in Naruto's heart or toss off the oxygen mask on his face.

"_Let us hope…we never meet again, Lady Tsunade."_ The robot bowed slightly while its comrades took off into the air. _"Best of luck in all your endeavours."_

_The stench of the dead was replaced with the smell of snakes._

_Naruto frowned._

The escort of robots arrived in Hidden Sound and Orochimaru, as per the prior message from a reconnaissance drone, fearfully wheeled Naruto into a private hospital room and went to work without hesitation or prompting.

The woman's hands shook as she operated on Naruto, nodding for the robot to keep the needle in Naruto's heart, pushing in tiny drops of medicine every once in a while, while she checked Naruto's blood type, genotype and chakra nature. Five seconds later, a fresh corpse was carried in by two Oto medics.

Too fresh…

The person looked to be of Naruto's age too.

Ai didn't care.

Orochimaru motioned to the cadaver. "This is a near hundred percent match to Lord Naruto's body type, blood type, genotype and chakra nature."

"Good, get it done." Ai said with finality and the Snake Sannin bowed numerous times as she gently tore out the victims ribs.

_Now, he could see something other than darkness and feel something other than nothing. The world was bathed in light and colour and he was looking down on himself, watching in silence as Orochimaru and a small team of doctors rushed about him to sustain his life._

_The whiplash of activity got to him. _

_Was he going to heaven or was he going to hell?_

"We're losing him?" Kabuto said, frantic.

"Again?" a doctor answered and pumped Naruto's body with a fresh dose of adrenaline and pain killers. "This is the fifth time."

"Master truly is one to be feared." Orochimaru muttered to herself. Naruto had already died once on the way to Oto and at least died four times on the operating table. His blood coated their hands as they hastily, but carefully, set his bones and healed his muscles and skin, gradually restoring his body back to normal.

The young inventor still could not breathe by himself in spite of having two functioning lungs and strong medicine pumping through his veins.

"His heart isn't working." Kabuto muttered, wheeling a small machine in, buzzing with electricity, and placed the two metallic plates on Naruto's chest. Orochimaru took the machine from his apprentice and rubbed the plates together. "Start low."

Kabuto cranked the machine up a little and Orochimaru pushed it onto Naruto's chest.

"Clear!"

_Naruto felt himself get violently yanked down, grunting under the strength of the pull._

Orochimaru checked Naruto's heart monitor and cursed. Ai looked to the doctor and said. "His heart is working-" then, thirty seconds later, Naruto's heart stopped pumping blood.

_A gentle hand was placed on Naruto's shoulder, pulling him upwards._

"No brain activity." The super computer said, sending a warning glare to the shaking snake lady. It didn't have the subtle tech, the spare bodies or the medicine to handle the surgery all on its own but Orochimaru had it all in abundance, especially with all the illegal experiments on the human body she had conducted throughout her life. The snake Sannin had the fingers and the expertise while Ai only had her memories; Naruto was the one that was most likely to be able to properly utilize that knowledge than the computer ever could. The Alpha Lightning drone grabbed the scientist by the front of her surgeon's gown and growled, forcing the Sannin to look at the severely cracked visors of the tech goggles. "Do. Something."

Ai pushed Orochimaru back and the scientist nodded quickly, hitting Naruto's chest with another bolt of electricity. "Clear!"

Naruto's body jerked under the electric metal plates, then settled again.

No response.

_The boys ghost felt itself get pulled down again, though weaker, while the hand resolutely kept urging him upwards._

"Run another scan of his body." The Sannin spat and Kabuto nodded, flipping through a few hand seals and roving his glowing green hands over Naruto's prone form.

"His kidneys are shutting down." The medic keeping the oxygen mask scowled and released the mask, placing his left hand on Naruto's chest and keeping the mask steady with his other hand. His left hand glowed green.

"His lungs are collapsing."

The last medic frantically looked between Naruto's heart and brain monitor and shouted. "No brain activity!"

Ai silently stared at Naruto's body, then looked up at Orochimaru.

He was dead.

Again.

Ai began making the order for its master's drones to level Oto, then return to Konoha and destroy all life there as well.

That was when Orochimaru yelled and stabbed Naruto's chest with a large needle.

The monitors all spiked jaggedly-

_Aaargh!_

_Naruto's whole body jerked downwards, the hand on his shoulder stubbornly stayed._

"Adrenaline." The Sannin panted desperately, hearing the sirens that his village was under attack, no doubt from the silent super computer standing before it. "His kidneys were the first to shut down, so no adrenaline in his body. I pumped him with more than enough just now."

Ai stayed its hand, just a little, and stayed silent, fixing Orochimaru with a short look, then lowering its goggles down to its master, lying on the bed. He was naked, besides for a shredded pair of dark red boxers, and the area that had been replaced was visibly paler than the boys already pale body. His jaw, the one taken from the donor, fit perfectly but the scientist still had to rigorously clean it of all bacteria before putting it on Naruto.

Orochimaru cut Naruto's stomach open and gently pushed aside his small and large intestine, reaching the kidneys all the way at his back. They couldn't flip Naruto onto his front because the boy still couldn't breathe on his own. "Right kidney is a lost cause," the black haired woman muttered but Ai heard. "Left kidney is damaged." They performed a quick transplant, replacing the right with that of yet another fresh donor. They worked on the damaged kidney.

Another shot of adrenaline.

Naruto's monitors screamed.

Another shot of electricity.

Naruto's body briefly jolted in response.

Four straight hours of operating on the boy and he was still _just_ toeing the line between life and death.

They were all exhausted.

They were all soaked in Naruto's blood, low on chakra and low on energy.

"His heart isn't strong enough to pump blood," Orochimaru said, exhaling through her nose. "We can't perform a transplant on him-"

"Why not?" Ai asked.

"Master Naruto is too weak," the woman's subordinates quirked up at the Sannin's submissive tone. "His body has gone through too much for only today. If we add in a heart transplant then he will die, this time for _real_." She motioned to Kabuto, who had his glowing hand over Naruto's open chest, directly over Naruto's exposed heart. "He is manually circulating his blood so Master Naruto doesn't die, _again_." The number of wires and tubes connected to Naruto's body increased more with the addition of a machine that took over what Kabuto had been doing for the past two hours. "I had my ninjas steal this from Suna but unless you want Master Naruto to be connected to it for the rest of his life, then I suggest you wait at least a month for his body to heal and strengthen."

"We don't _have_ a month." The computer said to itself. "That will be all." Ai said aloud. "Your help has been greatly appreciated."

Cleaning drones flew into the room and lifted up the machines and Naruto's hospital bed.

Orochimaru hastily said. "I don't think-"

"You'll be hearing from us soon."

The sooner they could get off this kami forsaken continent, the better.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

Naruto felt himself sway from side to side.

Curious…

He was lying on his back.

The young inventor grumbled and his burning red eyes tiredly opened.

The boat rocked calmly on the water, not shaking too much. At the helm, a short distance down from him, he saw two Alpha Water drones staring over the water, mutely humming with sounds and vibrations as they kept the water in a ten mile radius around Naruto calm.

The gentle purr of an engine floated into Naruto's ear, his eyes caught the assembled engine propelling the boat onwards, sitting between the two water manipulating drones.

There was a wooden roof over his head and wooden planks around him, spacious enough to contain him and his life support, tubes and wires riddled his body.

Wait…

Life support …?

He glanced down and immediately regretted it.

His exposed, bloody heart beat faster and his fingers twitched. He was freaking out. He couldn't feel anything, his whole body was numb, but it felt too much like his previous out-of-body experience with his expectation and _morbid_ anticipation of pain but in the end feeling nothing, including not having his heart exposed and certainly not the life support tubes wired to his body.

The sea outside of the manipulation of the two robots crashed and smashed violently, while within the circle was complete peace, even as they pushed on.

"_Urgghhkkkkk!_" he choked and his head flopped back. His lungs felt blocked as his mind went into shock. "_Gacckkkkk-_"

He passed out.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The distant sounds of construction work being done woke him up.

Naruto smacked his dry lips and groaned tiredly as he opened his eyes.

He was still in the wide, assembled boat house, lying on his bed, but this time he was fully clothed and connected to fewer machines; he was wearing a large red beanie, covering his head besides a stubborn bang falling down from the front, a black scarf was wrapped multiple times around his neck and he was in a short sleeved black shirt and a thick grey sweater with snowy designs on it with an even larger black coat covering his whole body. He also had on grey pants and thick socks but no shoes.

Naruto tried to sit up to fully look around his environment but a sharp pain in his chest stopped him and he fell back with a wince.

"Owwww…"

He allowed the familiar sounds coming from the distance lull his mind away from the pain.

He noticed he was rocking ever so subtly but, from what he could perceive, the boat wasn't moving.

Trees creaked slowly as they were felled, saws vigorously worked to chop of logs into precise, workable bits, hammers cracked down on long and short nails, securing metal and wooden pieces to whatever it was that was being built. Mallets crashed down on plates of metal-whether it was steel, lead, aluminium, or any other kind of metal-and straightened out them into neat sheets to be used for the building. The loud sounds of digging and drilling rushed up to him as well, jackhammers and the earth being scooped up in massive clumps, power drills whined as they pushed in screw after screw into wood and metal.

Naruto's eyebrows furrowed in mild confusion.

He couldn't hear anyone yelling out instructions, which was pretty much an unvoiced requirement on construction sites.

The room he was in was a bit unassuming, dull even. His ears twitched at the low hum of the boats engine and the whisper of heat flowing from the heaters in the corners of the room.

The wind changed and Naruto inhaled deeply, his stomach rumbled at the aroma that attacked his nose.

"Whus…cookin'?" Naruto's slurred, the effects of the medicine in his system still taking their effect. The thin tubes running into his arms kept up a steady drip of liquid. The machines weren't as many as before but they were no less intimidating. Naruto weakly licked his bottom lip at the tantalizing smell wafting through the air.

Fish stew with tofu and vegetables, his nose aptly informed him.

There was a low whine approaching him and he looked to his left when a cleaning drone looked down on him, the tech goggles perched over its glowing blue eyes. _"Sir, you're awake!"_

"Ai…" Naruto whispered, coughing away from the super computer wearing cleaning robot. "Wuuusaaaaaapppp~"

He could hear the tickled tone in his friend's voice. _"The anaesthesia still hasn't worn off huh."_

A shiver travelled through the genius and he coughed again, trying to turn onto his side but still too weak to move. Ai helped tip a bottle of water into Naruto's dry lips and the boy mumbled his thanks, shaking a little. "Ai…" he whispered, his eyes getting heavy. "I'm…I'm…I'm cold…c-can you…please turn up the…the heater?"

"_Of course, sir."_ The hum from the heaters increased and Naruto sighed in relief. The layers of clothes he wore helped warm up his frail body. _"I'm preparing fish stew with lots and lots of vegetables and tofu. It would be ready in thirty minutes."_ The robot bowed. _"I apologize for my inefficiency, boss."_

"Don't…worry about it, buddy. You're," he said, looking at the goggles with a small smile. "Not inefficient."

The cleaning robot awkwardly coughed into its fist. _"Thank you, sir."_

"…Why am I not dead, Ai?"

That was when Ai gave its most uncharacteristic, most unscientific, most un-computer-like response yet. It bowed its head and replied. _"Because, sir, it was not yet your time."_

"Ah…is that…so?"

"_Anyway,"_ Ai said quickly, wanting to duck away from the conversation on Naruto's brush with death and oblivion, not wanting to entertain the thought of losing its master. The bomb in the kunai had enough power to take out half of Konoha and Naruto had just barely gotten away from the effects with his life while all Ai sustained was a cracked visor, which the computer had fixed by itself some days ago. _"You are currently on a boat I assembled with the aid of your cleaning robots a few days ago-"_

"Days?" Naruto asked with a jolt.

"_Yes, days. You have been unconscious for the past fourteen days, sir."_ It went on. _"The fresh ocean air and the natural sunlight is doing wonders for your recovery, and as per what I was able to recall from Orochimaru's memories I have been inserting plenty of vitamins and minerals into your drip three times a day."_ It saw the confusion on Naruto's face. _"Your body is in need of those essential nutrients to increase the speed and effectiveness of your healing."_

"What about my…heart?"

"_Your heart, sir, is still unable to function by itself so I have to give you a small dose of adrenaline and a mild shock to your heart every six hours. This is until I am able to design a device that would perform this function indefinitely."_ Ai then hurriedly added. _"Not that I am not prepared to cater for your heart, and your whole being, for the rest of eternity-"_

"Thank you, Ai."

The sentient computer felt embarrassment and the cleaning robot coughed into its fist. _"It is an honour, boss."_

"Where…am I…?"

"_You are ten kilometres from an island a hundred six thousand, five hundred and seventy six miles north of the elemental nations."_

"You found an…island? Already?"

"_Yes, sir. By comparison, it is about a quarter of the size of Iwagakure and it is uninhabited by humans. There is a thriving population of wild animals and plants, the soil is fertile and the air is clean. The satellite was able to calculate and predict the periodic change in weather and I was able to gather that winter would last another four months."_

Naruto tried to keep his eyes open, he really did. Not that what Ai was saying wasn't fascinating. His satellite worked, he was very, very happy, and Ai had found an island, which was amazing, but he felt the soft tug of sleep bring his eyes down and weigh his whole body down.

The computer noticed the boy doze off. It leaned down and gently whispered. _"Boss?"_

"I'm jus…really…tired…"

"_It's ok, sir. I will ensure to keep your food hot and tell you more when you wake up."_ it instinctively checked Naruto's vitals with a quick scan from the goggles and confirmed that its master wasn't in any apparent health risk. _"Sleep well, sir."_

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The boat gently rocked on the still water.

Naruto's eyes popped open and he yawned widely, hiding his gaping maw with the back of his hand and licking his lips at the wonderful crackly movement of his limbs.

He felt…stronger. Not strong enough to stand up and not anywhere strong enough to fight but he was far stronger than he was since the last time he was awake.

The sound of construction was still going on far from the boat, on the small island.

His arms shook as they pushed him to sit back on his hospital bed; he lay back as tiredness swept through him from his last action

"_Ah, boss, how did you sleep?"_

Naruto looked down and he was wearing a different set of clothes, the same layers but different design and colours. "I slept ok. How long was I out?"

"_Two days."_ Give or take a few hours. _"Construction is going well, boss. A drainage system and electrical network has been installed but your house has not yet been completed. I am following your latest building blueprint."_ Naruto wanted to ask how he could help, but Ai beat him to it. _"It would be best if you spent your time resting and recuperating. At this stage of your recovery, stressful labour is detrimental and counterproductive to your healing. Please, sir, allow _me_ to handle it _all_."_

"…If you say so."

Ai was a super computer and Naruto's drones-cleaning, combat, suicide and reconnaissance-were all robots, so they could tirelessly work for days without rest as long as there was enough sunlight to charge their batteries and as long as their solar batteries were full so they could work at night. They didn't need lamps to see at night, because they had night vision and a hive-like coordination so as not to interrupt or disrupt the work of another, and though they had lesser self-awareness, Ai was the one that mostly gave commands and/or controlled them. Naruto's friend, from the last few updates, also had processing power and speed to handle multiple tasks at the same time, so Naruto wasn't too worried of overburdening the eager to please super computer.

"What of the animals on the island? Have they been disrupting the construction?"

"_No at all, sir. I have your Gamma Earth drones watching the surroundings. They have been wary to approach but there was a time a bear wanted to attack but it was dealt with promptly."_ The cleaning robot gave its boss a bowl of hot food and a spoon. _"Animals defer to those at the top of the hierarchy, and now you have arrived they would respectfully leave you alone."_

A large sweat drop grew on the side of Naruto's head as he slurped the delicious dish.

"_There is a silver mine on the other side of the island and a gem depository some miles west of the silver mine. I have been able to gather limestone and sand for the cement from an island exactly six hundred miles from this position and there are precious metals on another island forty nine miles south of this position."_ The robot pointed behind Naruto, past the wooden wall, as if to say that if Naruto could see through walls he could see the island of metal some miles away. _"The trees used in the construction come from your island, sir. There is an abundance in trees and I have had an Alpha Water drone dive underwater yesterday and it discovered a pocket of natural gas. I am currently having your Alpha Water, Fire and Earth drones construct an underwater pipeline so you can harness the natural gas."_ The Water manipulating drone would emit a unique extremely high pitched whistling sound that would force the water under its control. Then it would control the water to not touch the Fire and Earth drones as they worked underwater. _"Your island would be ready for you in exactly nine days."_

Naruto mumbled into his bowl of food. "Sounds like your building paradise, buddy."

"_Nothing but the best for you, boss."_ Ai said proudly, both at Naruto's unconscious compliment and at having the honour of doing Naruto's work for him. The grey-blonde haired genius had initially planned to steadily build his island paradise by himself, with his own hands, but with his incapacitated state Ai had taken charge of the situation.

"Can I at least _see_ what you're building?" his blueprint had specified only a one story house, which was more like a humble cottage, so Naruto wasn't sure what Ai was doing that would take nine more days to finish. Sure, installing the electricity, the drainage system, the gas line and the wall to keep wild animals away from the building efforts.

The goggle wearing robot bowed deeply. _"With all due respect, boss, no. My humblest apologies for denying you your current wish but I want your island 'paradise'"_ Ai quoted Naruto's words. _"To be a surprise. A-A _gift_, of sorts."_

Naruto raised an inquisitive eyebrow, and at the uncertainty Ai displayed in picking the last word. "Why a surprise?"

"_You have worked too hard for too long, boss. This is my gift to you for persevering."_

Naruto slowly smiled and tipped the bowl into his mouth, finishing the soupy remains and licking his mouth happily. "I can't thank you enough, buddy."

Ai felt warmth spread through its circuits as it bowed numerous times, again and again, and taking the bowl to serve Naruto more food. _"Again, sir, it is an honour."_ The computer finished in its mind. _'I only live to serve you, boss.'_

Unknowing of his friend's thoughts, Naruto merrily at his food.

"_Boss."_

"Hmmm~"

"_Hino has called to enquire about your health,"_ The Yakuza had used the deactivated drones to send the message, kicking and punching until she got an answer. _"She wishes to know if you are fine."_

"I'll call her later."

"_Kasi too. She informed me that the attack on Konoha was all over the Kumo Network News weeks ago and that you were at the centre of it,"_ according to the spies in Konoha. _"She wants to know if you are ok."_

Naruto scratched his chin, then answered. "Her too. I'll call her later."

"…_And,"_ Naruto moaned tiredly and Ai positively glowed at the entertaining discomfort Naruto showed for anyone other than Ai worrying about his health. _"Shion called,"_ through Hino._ "To tell you that she is convincing Demon country allies-"_ Kiri, Fang, Marsh, Tea, Darkness and Tree _"-To withdraw their alliances from Konoha, until they offer a verbal apology to you and all of Demon country for the Yondaime's actions-invasion and abduction of one under their protection. They also demand Consolation Funds for the 'trauma'" _Ai quoted Shion again. _"They put you and the people of Demon country through with Minato's reckless actions."_

It was more than that.

More than what Ai was saying.

And Naruto could guess the rest of the aftermath.

Konoha's own allies were re-evaluating their stance with the village, villages and countries didn't want to associate with the village that was getting negative attention; several digital documents, uncovered and sent by Ai to most nations, had uncovered Minato's ties with the Kumogakure underworld, specifically its organ and drug trade.

It helped explain how he was able to become a millionaire in his early twenties.

The rest of his legal accomplishments-real estate, trading, farming and the rest-could not have come about if the dead blonde Kage had not taken the bold step into darkness.

The Godaime, Tsunade Senju, had been forced to quickly sell off the Yondaime's properties outside of the village before their market value dropped down to less than zero and use the money to help rebuild and rehabilitate the village. All of the Namikaze and Uzumaki wealth had been withdrawn from foreign accounts before the nations could crack down and confiscate them-using shady though legal means to do so-and it too went in to remaking Konoha.

The village was suffering.

Only Suna stuck around but the sandy village was not in any state to supply funds to Konoha.

Naruto held out his bowl for his fourth serving.

No country had his name in the wanted section of their bingo books, though still listed him as double S rank and to be avoided at all costs. Orochimaru had come through and had coerced a good number of countries and villages to drop Naruto from being wanted dead or alive.

Ameagakure had come out of the shadows, a little, and had built an alliance with Kiriagakure and Waterfall country.

Naruto would later find out that Nagato, retrieving his Paths of Pein, hunted down Zetsu with Konan and set the plant man ablaze.

They were moving on with their lives as best as they could.

The recuperating boy slumped back and patted his full stomach, finished his last serving and shaking his head that he didn't want any more for now.

He felt at peace.

The quietness of the ocean, the low sound of work being done kilometres from him, the warmth of the sun amid the winter chill.

He was content.

Finally.

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

The nine day mark came by and Naruto stood on wobbly legs, alighting carefully off the boat and placing his legs on the sandy shore of _his_ island.

_His_ island.

That sounded good.

"_You will still need five full months of rest but as long as you don't overstress yourself-"_

"Ai," Naruto interrupted with a slight smile, walking slowly on the sand to a pave road. The drone stayed back to unload the boat, passing the tech goggles to another drone, a Beta Earth robot. "I'll be fine."

Two Beta Earth drones came to escort him, walking him through the thick forest as Naruto plodded on the solid pavement. The created pathway and the reassuring protection of his computer friend had him relax his shoulders. There was no wall between him and the forest around, as it lined both sides of the somewhat thin paved road, so he could see eyes peek out from the darkness and the sounds of animal chattering as he passed.

He saw the light at the end of the road.

He stopped at the end of the road and marvelled at his new living quarters.

"_Welcome home, boss."_

**OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO**

_Five years later_

It was quiet.

It was tranquil.

It was _slow_.

And he loved it.

He loved his new-or better yet, _current_-life.

Wearing thick farming gloves, Naruto used scooped soil and dug out a fairly large potato; he glanced over his shoulder at the hovering bowl and tossed the potato into it, where even more potatoes were.

The now eighteen year old young man sat back and wiped the perspiration on his forehead with the back of his gloved hands, briefly sitting back on his knees and looking out on the humble field before him, before hunching his shoulders and continuing his task of digging up potatoes.

Farming was an underrated line of work, and it was one of the many hobbies Naruto actively dabbled in. The dyed blonde-grey haired teen grew an assortment of vegetables and fruits-like carrots, cabbages, leaks, melons, cucumbers, tomatoes, groundnuts, cashews, apples, oranges, bananas, and many, many more. The act of growing crops of such fertile soil wasn't too much of a hassle for Naruto, because he was used to being patient, carefully tending to a project and he always felt a sort of joy in his heart during harvest. He farmed for himself, for the most part, but at the end of the month, when he was taking inventory of his crops and he realized he had too much in his store to be adequately preserved, he flew to the elemental nations and sold them in the Demon country market.

Naruto could _proudly_ say that his fruits and vegetables, due to his stringent care and the wonderful nature of the soil, were among the best in the market.

The teen smiled smugly to himself and the following cleaning robot-which, at that point, was several times evolved to be more sophisticated-curiously beeped as it noticed its master's satisfaction.

He also tried his hand at carpentry but he wasn't as serious with the craft as he was with farming. Then he went on and tried masonry, and built a small enclosure for some animals he was domesticating.

Hobbies kept his mind active and his body healthy.

Training insistently for the greater part of the day wasn't productive, not when the boy had better things on his mind than preparing for any fight.

He had his robots to defend him.

He had Ai at his side.

If the super computer had anything to say about it, Naruto would never raise his fists in combat ever again.

The tech goggles dangled from Naruto's neck, ever active in keeping the robots around the young inventor's living space operational and vigilant. Naruto had on overalls and a black shirt underneath with a simple pair of farming boots on his feet, these ones to prevent soil from entering his toenails or dirtying his feet.

Anyone that didn't know Naruto would immediately think that he was wasting his talents doing things _other_ than building and inventing. Naruto's knowledge of technology was so prodigious that it could be labelled a sin to see him lower himself to farm.

That would have been the opinion of those that didn't know him.

They wouldn't know that Naruto had already run through all the backed up inventions Ai's memory. They wouldn't know that Naruto had branched over to the field of medicine and science, more out of boredom and when he wasn't occupied with his hobbies, sifting through Orochimaru's memories and learning from other sources, like from online libraries. They wouldn't know that his mind had scooped up the knowledge, sucking it all up like a sponge and he had promptly invented machine after machine until he got bored and focused on his hobbies.

He had more Combat-Suicide-Reconnaissance-Cleaning robots than he could know what to do with, and they were all at stages of development unseen and unheard of by a majority of those on the continent. Naruto had also been keeping himself fit, not only with his many hobbies but with regular jogs around the island and light exercise, so he could say that he was somewhat stronger than when he was thirteen.

The man placed his hands onto his knees and huffed, getting to his feet and stretching his back, wincing at the sharp crack and laughing to himself at the worried beep from the cleaning robot.

He ambled to a shed and entered an installed bathroom, washing off the muck and changing into lighter clothes.

He exited the shed, wearing a light grey shirt and sweatpants with flip-flops on his feet. He said to the robot. "I'm thinking of having potato chips and roasted pork this afternoon, with ketchup."

Ai, on his neck, answered. _"On it, boss."_

Naruto walked off his farm with his hands behind his head, slinking along the smooth pathway around his house and into the forest. "What's next on my schedule for today?"

"_The termite infestation on your boat, boss."_

"Oh yeah…" he walked out from the forest and stopped at the end of the path, before the crystal white beach surrounding the northern side of his island. "I'll need to turn back to get the insecticide."

"_Not to worry, sir, it is already on the way."_

"Thanks, Ai."

"_You're very welcome, boss."_

Naruto plodded down the beach to his boat, a rather large vessel sitting on the shore, and he retrieved a canister of insect killer from a cleaner bot and his half mask, fixing his tech goggles over his eyes and he started fumigating his boat.

The device on his heart did its role.

Naruto's heart still had not been able to work on its own, so the inventor had bent down and designed a small, watch sized device that would be placed over his heart that would send a small, hardly felt jolt to his heart every six hours. This _jolt_ jump started his heart and, in case that was not enough, Naruto used his morning jogs to warm up his heart and his whole body.

He still wasn't sure how he survived the explosion at point blank range.

But never once did he question his luck, not anymore.

This quiet, tranquil and slow life was the one he had always wanted.

The solitude and silence was something he had always desired.

Naruto smiled lightly under his mask and ventured onto the ship to intensify his work.

Once upon a time, years ago, he had hated his very existence and had referred to himself as _less_ than scum and worse than trash because of his tainted sanity and his lost innocence.

Now was different.

Now was _very_ different.

Naruto loved his life now.

The young man finished fumigating the boat and sat down on the beat, watching the sun make its way across the sky and collecting a plate of chips from a robot. He saw a twinkle in the bright blue afternoon sky and he smiled again, a bit wider than before, and his eyes closed with a sigh.

He didn't know why he didn't die in the explosion and he didn't know why he didn't die on the operating table but he was grateful to be alive.

His father was dead.

His mother was dead.

Both died at his hands.

He could relax in the silence of solitude.

**Authors note**

**Thus, my dear readers, ends ****Redlights****.**

**I had so much fun writing this story and I enjoyed reading all your reviews. I used to think that this story wasn't any good and that I should change how I write (cuz its shit) but your fantastic words pushed me through to finish (yet another) story. For that, thank you all so very much for sticking with me and relishing in the ff journey.**

**I'm not sure which story to post next…**

**Still, did I do Naruto justice?**

**Let me know what you think of this epilogue, and the whole story too.**

**Please, stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you :)**

**Foy.**


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